


Lithium Flowers

by Alisette



Series: Do Not Go Gentle [1]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Fantastic Racism, Fix-It, Fluff and Angst, Interspecies Relationship(s), Non-Penetrative Sex, Other, Polyamory, Secret Relationship, Temporary Character Death, eventual Control ending, hope the term 'plug and play' means anything to y'all, otherwise it will soon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-08
Updated: 2019-07-29
Packaged: 2020-06-24 17:11:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 29,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19728091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alisette/pseuds/Alisette
Summary: Tali hadn't exactly expected to ever be working WITH the Geth, instead of on the disassembled parts of one. Now that she is sharing space with one in the Normandy she'll have to figure out the details sooner rather than later.





	1. In The Beginning

**Author's Note:**

> I've arrived at this fandom five years late with Starbucks, but here I am. I've found Tali's and Legion's relationship over the game deeply interesting and had to write something for this. That said, there are some changes to canon here. Most of them are the sort you can fit into the 'missing scenes' of canon, some less so. I also made some changes to Quarian biology, such as adding bio-luminescence because I greatly dislike the 'official' face reveal for Tali/Quarians in general. 
> 
> So here we are, in my little corner of 'I take canon and hit it with a hammer until it's the shape I like'. Maybe you'll like it too.

It had been a party, for sure. And they deserved a party after destroying the Collector base, without a single casualty on their part. So there'd been a party. With Kasumi bartending - and hitting on Kelly, she was pretty sure - and Shepard's music thumping over it all.  
And now it was winding down and people seemed to be pairing off, Shepard and Garrus had vanished together, and not as sneakily as they thought. Jacob and Miranda hadn't even tried for sneaky.

And she? Well Tali was feeling particularly lonely right now. There was someone she would have liked to celebrate with, but Kal wasn't here. So when everyone else was leaving, she'd thanked Kasumi for the many drinks and went to find some privacy. So she couldn't celebrate with someone but damn if she was going to let that stop her from having some fun.  
Her feet carried her down to engineering without her even thinking about it. There were a lot of quiet corners down there. Tali knew that maybe better than most people.

She found a nice, secluded spot, leaned against the wall as solidly as she could, and fired up the nerve stim program in her suit. At least she tried to. There was a pleasant tingle along her arms, and then it just fizzled out.  
"Oh for-!" she tried again two more times before she had to admit that there'd probably be some damage during the fight, and she couldn't fix it that quickly.  
Certainly not quickly enough to fix her current problem of 'slightly drunk, pretty horny, and absolutely frustrated'.

With a wordless shout of anger Tali banged her fist against the wall beside her.

"Creator-Tali’Zorah, do you require assistance?"

The words made her wheel around, hands going to her hip where she *didn’t* have a gun right now. Keelah, anything that size should make more sound when it moved, but Legion seemed to have an unfair knack for sneaking. Regardless, she shouldn’t be shooting Legion. Even if seeing a Geth at the edge of her vision did make her twitchy sometimes. It had been incredibly helpful during the run on the base. And if she was honest with herself, before that too. 

“Legion! You- no, I’m fine.” 

That didn’t seem to work. The little flaps around its optic flared out and up, its head twisted - that was Shepard’s concerned tilt of the head, and it was eerie to see on a machine.

“Your pulse rate and breathing are elevated, the energy readings of your suit are fluctuating. This indicates a malfunction. We can escort you to the med bay.” 

“There is no-” Tali sighed. “There is a minor malfunction in my suit, nothing dangerous. Just...inconvenient” 

There was a pause as Legion...what did it call it, established consensus? She couldn’t even imagine what that was like, inside there, all that arguing...except Legion seemed pretty even-keeled all the time, but maybe that was just because synthetics didn’t have feelings.

“We can correct any software malfunction quickly.” It took a step towards her and she leaned back instinctively, and it stopped again. 

But… but she really wanted her implants working right now and Legion was offering and she had seen its work. And Legion had plenty of chance to quite literally stab or shoot her in the back. And it wasn’t like her suit didn’t have plenty of fail safes against hacking, system failure or the like. All Quarians had it, but hers was a step above that too. She’d be fine.

“What...what sort of system access would you need?” 

“Connection to your suit’s systems. Once you activate it, we can see the malfunction and correct it. Estimated time for correction: 1.63 seconds, rounded up.” It was hard to read, but Legion seemed pleased by the estimate. 

Well that was pretty fast. Fast was what she wanted right now. Tali found herself nodding and she hadn’t even quite finished the gesture when a request for system access pinged her suit. She looked at Legion and granted it and then triggered the nerve stim. It predictably still failed.  
The synthetic didn’t fidget a lot but now it became even stiller as her suit informed her that something was editing her software. It really only took a second, then Legion’s voice came right out of the speakers in her suit.

“Starting function test” 

It was all the warning she got before her stim implants became active again. She’d gotten the deluxe version but even then, they’d never felt that good. It was like hands running all over her body, up her arms and legs, with a little more pressure over her ribs and the underside of her breasts, just like she liked it. 

“Oh.” She gasped and leaned back against the wall again, and the sensations vanished immediately, making way for Legion’s voice again.

“Creator Tali’Zorah? Did we damage you?” It sounded honestly concerned, and wasn’t that unexpected? 

“No no, I’m fine, just didn’t expect this. You...improved the function somewhat.” That was the understatement of the century. “You may continue your test, if you want” 

“Your implants now run ten percent more efficiently, and are tailored more closely to your physiology.” There was another slight pause, but it seemed shorter than usual when Legion made a decision. “We will be running your preferred program to ensure optimal functionality” 

And then it launched the program again, from the start. Hands sliding over her skin, kneading her hips, and up the inside of her thighs. Heat seemed to ripple in waves over her skin, almost like someone’s body sliding against hers, suction against her breast as if her suit was clinging tighter and that was new, and it was _fantastic._ Her knees went weak and she slid down the wall, panting as the implants slowly dialed up the intensity, focused on all the parts of her that were especially sensitive. It seemed to adapt more, focus on her reaction and she wasn’t sure if that was Legion but she also didn’t care. Her pleasure built and crested until she could feel nothing else, her entire body going tense as she rode it out, wave after wave of almost mind-numbingly intense sensation, each wave extending the last one a little more, a little higher until she thought her suit or her brain would just give out. Only then did the implants slowly dial down again, ebbing away back to baseline.  
She found herself sitting on the floor, panting so hard that the inside of her mask had started fogging up. She’d never felt this good in her life, as if her entire body was just heavy, glowing and warm.

A soft sound made her turn her head. For a moment the Geth looked hazy, until her suit’s systems cleared the fogging from her faceplate. It had knelt down beside her, head tilted in the same concerned way as before. “Creator Tali’Zorah? Are you well? Have the repairs been satisfactory?” 

“ ‘M fine.” More than fine. She took another deep breath “Your repairs are outstanding, thank you.” Tali slowly pushed herself up against the wall, still feeling a little shaky. She needn’t have bothered. Legion rose alongside her, a lot more fluid in motion and then offered her a hand up.

“I believe the proper reply is ‘you’re welcome’” It told her as it pulled her up to her feet proper and steadied her for a moment more. 

\-------------------------

She wasn’t sure how she’d ended up in her quarters, but evidently, she had, since she woke up in her bed, with the telltale pounding in her head that said ‘been to a really good party’. For a moment she just laid there, trying to order what had happened last night. Collector base run, everyone coming out alive but slightly beaten, the party afterwards, lots of drinks, suit mishap, Legion - _Legion?_ Oh Keelah. Tali sat up suddenly enough to make herself slightly nauseous for a moment. That… was a thing that had happened?  
A quick inspection of her suit’s logs did indeed confirm that it had happened. She had given system access to _a Geth_. Just how drunk had she been? Obviously the answer was ‘too drunk’ but okay. Okay she could deal with it, headache be damned.

But even a deeper dig through her suit’s readouts and logs revealed nothing untoward, at least nothing untoward against Quarians as a whole, or even her specifically. Legion had accessed the system, rerouted data around input from a broken sensor - aha, that had been the problem! - and… test run the system afterwards. Proceeding to give her what was probably the best orgasm of her life. 

That was just surreal. She leaned forward to put her hands over her faceplate. What had she been thinking? What had Legion been thinking? Surely it had known… had it? What if it hadn’t? That thought made her feel worse. Obviously you couldn’t molest a machine, but she got the weird feeling that maybe, somehow, she’d managed to do exactly that. 

She… would have to talk to it about it, wouldn’t she? At the very least, she had to apologize for what had happened. First, she got herself something for the pain, and a little bit to eat despite her stomach protesting it. Fainting on the way to the AI core because she’d been too miserable to eat was not a good way to have this particular conversation. 

It still seemed to take entirely too long to get to the AI core, and she was fidgeting enough along the way to make EDI ask her if she was alright. Which naturally she wasn’t, but this wasn’t a conversation she wanted to have with the ship, so she tried to brush her off as politely as possible, pretending not to hear what seemed to be concern in EDI’s voice.

Legion already seemed to be waiting for her when the door swished open.

“Creator Tali’Zorah.” It inclined its head to her.

“Legion. I, um. I would like to talk to you about something.” She’d have liked to have more privacy about it, but the ship… doubtlessly already knew. Maybe both synthetics had been talking about it? She felt slightly ill about it again. 

“If you wish. How can we help you, you have not sought us out before.” At least it didn’t sound upset? If anything, it sounded intrigued but could it be upset? Did it matter if it wasn’t if _she_ knew that she’d done something wrong? 

“I… would like to talk about yesterday, after the party. You um, you helped me with... my suit…” Oh no Tali already felt terrible about this, and it didn’t help that Legion didn’t have a real face that she could read and, well, it had body language but not...not like anything she knew and anyway it was all voluntary so who knew if that confused air it had right now was genu-

“Have the repairs had any side effects? We assumed that just routing around the sensor would fix it, but our experience with Quarian environment suits is limited” 

That kinda stopped her but also made it worse, somehow. “No, no, it’s fine, your work is fine I just. I wondered if you… do you know what you helped me repair?”  
Legion straightened up, the concerned tilt of head and drawn down flaps vanishing. If it had been organic she was fairly sure she’d have seen understanding dawn on its face. 

“Yes. You have nerve stimulation implants that interact with your suit, for the purpose of mimicking sexual intimacy with another person. The damaged sensor lead to a failure loop in the programming, keeping it from producing satisfactory levels of stimulation.” 

Ok, if she thought she’d been mortified before, she was ready to die now. It would be a rather unique way for a Geth to kill a Quarian, but it was imminent. Legion had...known...that she used nerve stims. And had helped her repair them. And use them. She might have been making a strangled little sound about it, too.

“Creator Tali’Zorah?” Yeah it absolutely sounded concerned now, maybe because she had her hands in front of her face and was still making that sound.

“I’m fine.” She wasn’t fine.

“You seem distressed, but we don’t understand why.” 

“I. I’m.” Oh Keelah, she would absolutely have to say it, wouldn’t she? Because of course Legion wouldn’t get it otherwise. “I’m trying to deal with the fact that we had sex.” There. She said it as quickly as possible, as if that would make it better.

There was a pause from Legion, probably as it tried to integrate the new information. It was a pretty long pause, considering how fast it normally did what passed for thinking for a Geth. 

“Interesting. The experience differed considerably from archived Geth memories about intercourse with the Creators. We found this a more balanced experience.” 

Wait what? “Archived memories?” Tali as pretty sure she sounded a little bit hysteric. Just a touch. Maybe to make up about how cool and collected Legion sounded about it all 

“Yes. Quarian-Geth relations before the Morning War did occasionally run more physical, and suitable hardware upgrades for a platform were possible, if rare.”

“Oh Keelah. I… need to sit down for a moment.” She just sat down on the floor and put her hands in front of her face for a bit because not looking at Legion seemed the preferable option, though she could hear it crouch down besides her. She wanted to ask about this, and at the same time, she really, really didn’t want to have more details than she already had.

“So you’re… ok with what happened last night? You made it sound like you liked it, even” Because that was the question that was currently bothering her most of all, though she was starting to suspect she knew the answer, since Legion had clearly known what it was doing to her. It might even have enjoyed it, on some strange, synthetic level.

“Yes. We realized quickly which parts of your program were malfunctioning, and why. If we had not wanted to help with it, we would have refused you and withdrawn.  
We do not ‘enjoy’ things like organics do, but the interaction was interesting and supplied us with new information. This platform was constructed with the goal of positively interacting with organics. Last night’s interaction fulfills those parameters. Calling it ‘enjoyment’ would be misunderstanding, but we do consider it a satisfactory experience.” 

That… wasn’t helping. Ok it was helping her feel better because apparently Legion didn’t consider itself particularly molested but now she had a whole other line of things to feel bad about. She...had to think about this, yes. Somewhere else. Somewhere Legion wasn’t. Preferably, somewhere that had turian brandy. Yes, yes that was a good idea. She inhaled and got up again, trying her best not to look at Legion as it rose beside her, its flaps oddly restless around its optic.

“I’m sorry, I should go. Thank you for your help, again.”  
She didn’t exactly flee, but it was a very brisk walk to her quarters anyways.

\-----------

It wasn’t turian brandy, but turned out that turian wine was good enough. She didn’t really want to be drunk anyway, considering how _that_ had gone last time, but it made it...easier to cope with everything. Or maybe just easier to think about. She was trying to be rational about it. 

She had let a Geth get to her suit software (bad). It had resulted in the best orgasm of her life so far ( _good_ ) except for the part where she’d basically gone and had sex with a Geth (BAD). Which apparently hadn’t been unheard off between Quarians and Geth before the War (weird) and Legion didn’t mind it at all (good) and had even found it ‘satisfactory’ ( _weird_ ).  
On top of that entire mess, it was hard to think of Legion as not-a-person. After sharing space and going through dangerous missions together...and alright, her drone wasn’t a person, but her drone also didn’t debate philosophical theories on the afterlife with drell assassins in the crew mess. Or beatbox. She was still trying to come to grips with that particular habit, and apparently so far nobody else had worked up the courage to ask Legion about it, either. 

So now she wasn’t sure what to think at all, and nobody else on board would understand because well, nobody else on board was a Quarian and alright some of them were just as suspicious about Legion - and EDI when it came to that - but they were more worried about getting backstabbed, not… not worried about whether or not they counted as people. In fact an awful lot of the crew didn’t seem to mind at all interacting with them as people. Shepard in particular and that made Tali feel kind of bad, really.

Shepard was a good friend, and one of the kindest people she knew who still could take your head off at a hundred paces, but still. Having Shepard treat Legion like a person made Tali feel like _she_ was in the wrong for questioning if it even was one to begin with. 

She needed to talk to someone. Someone who’d understand. Someone she could trust. 

So naturally she ended up sitting down on her private terminal and calling Kal’Reegar. With any luck he wouldn’t be on duty or patrol somewhere.  
She was lucky. Kal picked the call up right away, posture a little tired, but he perked right up when he saw her. Not for long, because even with her face hidden away, she’d never been that good an actor and he could just tell that something was up.

“Tali! I’m glad to see you, but somehow you don’t look like this is a courtesy check-in.” 

“Kal.” She smiled, hoping that the transmission would pick up enough of her bioluminescent patches to make it clear. “I’m… afraid not. If you’re busy, it’s not that pressing, I don’t want to impose.” 

“You’re not imposing. I have some time. Even some privacy, I’m still on light duty and the rest of my squad is out. So, what’s bothering you?” 

She told him, all of it. Finding Legion, Shepard deciding to take the Geth on board and bring it online, interactions since then, up to and including what had happened after the party and today. He listened to all of it, without talking, just listening and forming his opinion and honestly, she appreciated that so much about him, she wanted the outside perspective of someone who would get it. He would.

“Hm. I can see why you’re conflicted. Your father was… very strict in his opinions about the Geth. And I understand why, but you know my opinion on the subject. So far, Legion seems to have tried being polite to you, to the best of its ability, yes?” 

“Yeah. And I know, you think picking fights with the Geth is stupid.” She relaxed a little. Kal didn’t seem upset at all, if anything he just seemed understanding.

“If you want my opinion on it… I think you’re not really losing anything if you go forward considering that Legion might be a person. If you’re wrong then you’ve just been nice to a machine, and I’ve seen you fuss over your drone. If you’re right then well, you’ve been nice to a person, and you’re usually doing your best to be just that. You can still be careful, nobody’s expecting you to fully trust anyone you met such a short time ago. Does that sound like a reasonable deal to you?” 

“I...yeah, yeah it does. Doesn’t solve the other issue though” The one where she’d...had sex with a Geth. God, thinking about it more often did not make it less weird.

“Ah no, that I can’t help with, I’m afraid, but luckily I’m not a jealous man and you have my blessings” Even if she hadn’t been able to see his patches, the teasing in his voice was obvious enough. 

“Kal!” 

“Sorry, I just had to. But I’m afraid you will have to figure that out yourself. You’re the smartest person I know, you’ll get it done. I just wanted you to know that I’m not upset or jealous about it, alright? I love you. We’re just far apart right now.” 

“I. Thank you. I love you too” She reached out to the terminal and he mirrored the gesture. 

“Let me know how this goes, yes? You’re probably the first Quarian who’s had peaceful contact with a Geth in centuries, make the most of it. Mark my words, before long you’ll be the expert on them.” 

“Oh hush. I mean, you’re probably right but...yeah. Alright, you’re right. Thank you for listening to me.” 

“Any time. Well almost, I’ve got my patrol round upcoming so maybe not in the next six hours, but otherwise any time. Talk to you soon. Keelah se’lai” 

“Keelah se’lai” She replied and ended the call, feeling much better already. Still confused about considerable parts of it, but the sick, worried feeling in the pit of her stomach had lifted. 

\-----------------

It was quiet for a few days. They hadn’t gone back through the Omega Relay yet, since the Normandy had taken some damage during their arrival. Nothing big, but enough to keep her and the other engineers busy, and enough to make her leery about using the relay yet. So she spent most of her time repairing things, which means spending a lot of time with Legion, too. It was almost a little flattering, being able to keep up with an entity made up of a thousand minds. It had helped her get used to it all, until its presence was as normal as Adams’. 

That didn’t stop her from being surprised when Legion approached her after she’d retreated to a corner of the mess, where things were quieter. 

“Creator Tali’Zorah?” 

She looked up from the file she was working on, just a little writing on the side, because everyone needed a hobby, and was immediately concerned. Over the last few days she had gotten better at reading what passed for body language with Legion. It looked..worried, face flaps pulled in tight and posture leaned back, ready to brace for the metaphorical explosion.

“Legion, is there something wrong? It’s not the capacitors, is it, I’m sure we put them in right-” 

“No, the capacitors are working as you predicted. We have a more personal request” 

Somehow that was even more concerning, but she nodded and gestured at the seat opposite from her. Polite, right? Also better than staring up that far. It took her up on it and sat down, a little awkwardly.  
“Alright, what can I help you with?” 

“We have been trying to gain a better understanding of interpersonal relationships for organics. Simulation seemed a good starting point. But our skills don’t seem to improve. We believe that you could help us, the simulation is based on a movie you have been quoting on occasion” 

Tali needed a moment to translate that into normal-people-words. “You...have been playing Fleet And Flotilla? The dating sim? And you want me to help you with it because you’re not good at it?” 

“Affirmative” 

She was probably imagining it, but it seemed a little contrite about it. It was almost cute. And honestly… she was good at the game. She loved the movie and everything else to do with it, and she might or might not have played every romance path often enough to be able to quote them, too.

“Alright. I’ll help you, but not here” Absolutely not here. The rest of the crew didn’t need to know about her obsession. 

They ended up in the AI core, with Tali sitting cross legged on the little platform Legion had been placed on first. She had a small portable screen on her lap and had Legion boot up its game for her. The logs were enlightening to say the least. Legion’s ‘hopeless’ rating was pretty accurate in her opinion.

“We don’t understand why we don’t seem to improve.” Legion was looking at the screen, even though it probably didn’t need to.

“Well, judging by what I can see, you’ve been trying to do too much at once. Some of the characters want to be courted more extensively, and others will always refuse you if you try to romance someone else at the same time” 

“We don’t understand”  
“Some of the characters are jealous and don’t want to share, some just prefer monogamy. Don’t ask me why, some people just are like that, so some characters are coded like that too. There’s hints in game about who’ll react badly to it, and I’d generally suggest that you pick someone you want to pursue and focus on them.” Which hadn’t happened so far, from what she could tell. “So what sort of person are you aiming for? I can give you better tips if I know who you want to woo” 

There was a pause in which she realize that she’d basically just asked Legion for its dating preferences, which was...probably not something the Geth as a whole had ever considered before, she imagined.

“No data. We do not ‘woo’.” 

Yeah that was what she had expected. “Just pretend, for a moment, that you do. It is after all the point of a dating sim. So if you were to pursue a relationship with someone - let’s say a platonic one. I’m a big believer that you should be good friends with your lovers, so that works just as well. And a lot of romantic relationships start as friendships, too. So, what sort of person would you like to be friends with?” 

This time she wasn’t so worried about the pause. It was a hard enough question for someone who was used to the idea of dating, Legion probably need a while to reach a decision. Or consensus.

It was still a pretty long pause before Legion spoke again. “Establishment of parameters for ‘friendship’ complicated, organics define the concept vaguely and often overlap it with concepts of ‘love’. We do not experience such emotions.” 

Tali sighed. “Do you have preferences for people you spend time with? Of the crew, I mean.” She should have expected this to be hard, and yet.

“Yes. Some crew members are less uncomfortable around us, or offer interesting conversation and data to us. Some try to gain an understanding of us in turn without signs of hostility. A few crew members seem to go out of their way to make us more comfortable” 

Alright, that she could work with. “So… someone smart, and empathic, and curious? Likes to learn about other species, tries to interact with them on equal basis?” 

“Affirmative” 

Hmmm. sounded kind of like Shepard, which alright that made sense, Shepard had been very nice to Legion, welcomed them aboard...which character would be most like that? There were a few options there…

“Do you prefer topics of conversation you’re very well versed in, or rather something that’ll teach you something new?” 

“Yes.”

Well there went nothing. But, she could make do with what she had. “Alright, I think those two would be the best fit” She pulled up the character profiles. “You can start on both of them and see which storyline looks more promising to you, fortunately neither is the jealous kind before you enter a relationship with them.”

She could tell when Legion connected to the portable screen, leaving through logs and then loading a safe file to start. Twentieth time was the charm?

“Your help is appreciated, Creator Tali’Zorah. Thank you.” 

\--------

Tali wasn’t sure why they still had gotten the mission dossier after what they’d done to the Collector base. The Illusive Man had to be pretty mad at them. Maybe it was supposed to be a suicide run of sorts, but after they’d just finished something that counted as an actual suicide run? It was starting to feel like a pretty weak try.

It was something to do with VI, so Shepard had brought both her and Legion. Considering the amount of geth they were facing, it had been the right choice. As the problem started to come together - VI experience, VI-human hybridization and that had made Legion make a sound that was as close to rage as she’d ever heard it come, and honestly she understood why. After what they’d just seen in the Collector base, with that horrible human-machine reaper embryo, she felt about ready to deck this Dr.Archer herself.

They had progressed through the bases, carefully, taking out Geth as they went, and Tali found herself wondering what Legion thought about having to fight Geth. Not the ‘heretics’ that had allied themselves with the Reapers, but Geth taken over by some other sort of intelligence. She would have liked to ask, but there was no time for it, and she didn’t want to distract it, either. There was a time and place for asking your sniper questions, and ‘middle of a fire fight with enemies that had rocket launchers’ was not one of them.

Progress was slow but steady, right until a door came down between them and Shepard. She rushed to the door, hand banging against it for a moment as she called for her friend, then radioed her. To her relief Shepard replied immediately. She was fine, and was going to go forward on her own, sure that she was close to the solution, and she probably was. Shepard had a knack for gettings things done in the face of impossible odds.

But that didn’t mean that she had to do them alone. That’s what teams were for, what friends were for. So Tali immediately went to start hacking the door, or trying to. It was hard, the VI was tricksy and fast, almost as fast as Legion, but only almost. And Shepard was distracting it, too. 

Her task had her entirely absorbed, which was her only excuse as to why the shout of ‘Creator!’ only dimly made it into her awareness. The following ‘Tali!’, backed by all of Legion’s bulk pushing her against the wall however had all of her attention. She only had a moment of confused ‘wh-’ before a rocket exploded almost in her face. The force of it ate through Legion’s shield and crushed it further against her with the angry sound of denting and tearing metal, but her own shields held. 

Her faceplate darkened in a split second to compensate for the glare and she already had her gun up and firing, straight past Legion’s - burnt, fizzling - arm before it came back to its normal coloration. She almost overclocked her heat sink firing into the Geth, until it was a twitching pile of scrap on the floor, then popped it out and stepped around Legion to cover him as his shields came back online, slow and she could see the flickering now. Damaged, then. She’d fix that in a second. But first… first the other two Geth approaching down the corridor had to go. Her shotgun didn’t have the range for it but her drone sure did. She let Chikktika distract them as she approached. Her shields could take the hits until she was in range for her shotgun to blow their heads clean off. 

She waited for a moment, even had her drone scout further down the corridor, but nobody else seemed to be eager to meet the business end of her weapon, so she slowly retreated back to where Legion leaned at the wall behind some cover.  
He still looked bad, two of the delicate little flaps around his optic almost torn off, scorch marks all over the chest, shoulders and one arm and some sizzling inside his chest cavity where cable insulation had burnt off. The optic itself had a crack, too, but was still bright.

She crouched down in front of him, still keeping half an eye on the corridor and then setting Chikktika into guard mode to let her focus on repairs.  
“Legion, can you give me a damage report? What do you need for repairs?” 

“We are at seventy-eight percent functionality. Mandatory repairs require cable insulation wrapping, welding, and replacement of structurally damaged plates in the upper right shoulder area. Everything else is cosmetic only.” 

Tali nodded and started towards the downed Geth. She was very, very good at taking them apart and finding the functional parts, and she found that she knew pretty exactly which parts would match Legion’s plating enough to work, and which would be too small. Welding materials and insulation wrapping she had on herself at all times anyways. Despite what Legion had said, she also took one optic glass that had survived the onslaught, and a few tiny hinges. Just in case. 

It was still quiet from her side of the doors, which worried her. It probably meant that Shepard was being one massive distraction elsewhere, but right now she couldn’t help her. Repairs to the teammate she had with her first, door hacking afterwards. 

Legion did most of the repairs himself, with her watching the corridor and only helping on a few hard to reach places inside the chest. For the first time in a long while, she felt weird reaching into a machine to wrap sparking cables in tape and tuck them safely out of the way. Legion was watching the corridor over her shoulder as she did, his Widow held steady on the box they were cowering behind. She’d only just finished with the last line and was thinking about going back to the door when it swished open and Shepard came back out, carrying a pale human male with all the ease her cybernetic implants allowed her. 

Her eyebrows went all the way up when she saw Legion and Tali crouched down with a lot of disassembled geth in the hallway.

“Seems I missed some fun?” 

“Seems you had some fun of your own” Tali replied as she stood, nodding at the man. Legion rose with her, less fluid than normal and hm, she would have to look at the servos and gears in its legs later. It seemed to be favouring the left one. 

“Yeah. Tali, Legion, meet David. David, these people are part of my team, they helped get you out.” Shepard took a breath. “And now let’s get out of here, David needs something better than medi-gel, and Dr.Chakwas is just the person to help.”

The man - David - looked at them both and nodded. His eyes lingered on Legion for a moment, went from it to the destroyed Geth and back, then he shrugged. He just looked very very tired, in the way sleep alone wouldn’t fix. Shepard was right, they should get back to the Normandy.

“Yeah, let’s go, David isn’t the only one who needs to get out of here.” 

\-----------------------------

They split up once they were back on the ship, Shepard taking their erstwhile guest to the medbay while Tali just followed Legion back to the AI core. Once there it stopped to look at her, body language even more hobbled that normally by the damaged flaps. 

“Do you require something, Creator Tali’Zorah?” 

“Sorta. I require you to sit down and tell me what’s wrong with your knee. I can see you favouring your left leg.” 

“We will make repairs tomorrow.”

“And I will make repairs now. Sit down.” Tali was fairly sure her glare didn’t read through her faceplate, but Legion seemed to get her point anyway. It sat down on the berth, and she took that as permission enough to step close and kneel down in front of it to gently stretch out the damaged leg.

“This really isn’t necessary.” Legion sounded almost hesitant about it, but she was having none of it.

“It is. Looks like a shrapnel puncture, with the shrapnel still embedded. If you have damage sensors for this, you should probably turn them off now” She unrolled a small bag of tools from a bag on her hip and started to work the shrapnel loose with a pair of fine tweezers. She could see the circuitry around the damage and tried not to touch any of it as she teased the piece out and dropped it to the side. The joint was damaged, but the servos around it seemed fine. She leaned a little closer to start welding it shut with little pieces of metal she shaved off another Geth panel she’d picked up planet-side, then checked her work over with a little UV-flashlight, letting it show her the remaining minuscule damages. It was fiddly enough work to make her forget all about time and the fact that she was crouched down long enough that she had to roll her head a little when she was done.

“Alright, that’s done.” 

She stood back up, but when Legion tried to follow suit she held up a hand. “No no, stay there, I’ll fix the other damages too, best to let the welds cool some anyway before you do anything on that leg” And with that she climbed onto the berth beside Legion and shone her flashlight over the damaged face flaps. It looked like the hinges were bent and torn, and really wasn’t it good that she had decided to pick some small hinges off the destroyed Geth earlier? 

“Please hold still, I’m sure you know how delicate this is.” 

“Creator Tali’Zorah, this is really only an aesthetic repair, it shouldn’t take priority.” 

“You use them to communicate with organics, don’t you? We’re not in combat anymore, there’s no reason not to fix them now” 

“Affirmative” 

There. She leaned closer to get a good angle for taking off the first flat, gently unhooking the wires and lines to the hinges before removing them. The angle continued to be awkward, and she shifted closer and closer, until she was leaning onto Legion’s shoulder to steady herself. 

“So how is your progress in Fleet and Flotilla looking? Did my tips help any?” She asked just as she put the first flap down.  
“Organics are distracted by auditory input during detail work.” 

“I’m not, I usually listen to music through my suit speakers while I work, it helps me focus. Seems rude to do that while working on you when we can just talk. So, how is it going?” 

“It is...going well. We have managed to progress to a first date and are now gathering information on the target to ensure success” 

“That’s a very tactical way of going about it” Tali snorted and swapped the hinges out, tightening tiny screws and aligning joints. “But I’m glad you’re making progress. Is it helping you understand organics?” 

“Tactical approaches are most promising. We have learnt that organics value honesty in interpersonal relationships, but sometimes prefer falsehoods in matters of small personal preferences, such as music or vids. Is this accurate to non-simulated relationships?” 

She thought about it for a moment while she connected the cables back in place. “I think that’s about right. Being honest might be hurtful in the short term, but usually long term it works out better, but telling someone that you hate their favourite writer is just rude.”  
She shifted to get at the next plate, leaning further onto Legion and finally shuffling to straddle one of its thighs to have a more stable position. 

That close she noted that Legion was actually warm. It made sense, all those little servos and engines moving it around had to produce heat, probably dispersed over surface plating. It was a surprising change, the machinery she usually worked with tended to be cool and inert. But then again, it usually also didn’t talk to her, at least not like that. 

“I think I’ll fix your optic lens first, the cables will be easier to access like that.” She was gentle about it, gloved finger tips running around the edge of the damaged glass to find the little latches and screws that kept it in place and unhook them all by feel alone. She even closed her eyes to focus better. 

“I’m sorry if this is uncomfortable” 

“It isn’t” Legion tilted his head just enough to let her get at the last little latch.

“Right. I was just thinking that taking the lens off probably impacts your vision. I find it pretty uncomfortable when doctors have to do anything on my eyes.” She lifted the lens off and replaced it with the new one. It was just a little out of reach on her new position, forcing her to lean over quite a bit to reach it. In her current position, that left her wobbly, but before she could do more than slip a finger width, Legion’s arm wrapped around her waist, hand light on her back to steady her. 

“This platform is equipped with infrared sensors on strategic points to prevent heat damage. We are currently running this data through graphic interpretation to let us track your movements even with diminished optical input.” 

Well that explained how it’d caught her, and she righted herself again, settled solidly back on the leg. “That explains a lot. Well, I’ll be quick about replacing the lens and you can have your full range of vision back” 

Knowing where the latches were and how they were supposed to fit, she made to put it back, eyes closed in concentration again. Her gloves were meant for work like that, sturdy enough to avoid punctures but at the same time, flexible and thin enough that she could feel all the details and gently twist the lens into place. There was a fine little click and then the light came back. She couldn’t help but smile at Legion.

“There, good as new. Time for the final flap and then you can test your leg.” 

“Acknowledged. Creator Tali’Zorah, we have an inquiry.” 

“Oh? Yeah sure, ask me.” She had to lean close and up again, half-way rising from Legion’s leg to get at the dorsal edge of the flap. She did sort of notice that Legion still had a hand not-quite on her, hovering just over her hip, maybe in case he needed to catch her again. 

“Why did you pick this lens off a destroyed platform? This item is not specific to Geth constructions or designs. Studying it will not give new insights to your Fleet.” 

“That’s not why I took it. You were damaged, and I knew that I could fix the damages if there were suitable parts. Leaving them behind would have been stupid.” 

The repaired flaps perked right up. Score for her abilities! 

“Quarians value conservation of resources and reduction of waste, based on the needs of the Fleet”

“Well...yes. But I just wanted to help you, and this gave me the materials to do so.” Tali shrugged. 

“...We do not understand, but appreciate the answer” The flaps settled down again, which was good because otherwise there was a real risk that she would get her fingers caught in one. 

She had been just about to connect the last wire back, leaned against Legion’ chest for balance again when the door to the AI core wooshed open. She turned half-around, hands still framing Legion’s optic and perched on its thigh as she was. Now his hand did come to rest on her hip, keeping her center of gravity stable.  
Joker stopped dead in the door, looked at them both, and then put his hands up and retreated as speedily as he could without fracturing anything.  
“Oh wow guys, didn’t mean to disturb you at all, have fun! Maybe put a sock on the door or something next time, let a guy know that-!” The door closed again, cutting off whatever he thought a ‘sock on the door’ would warn someone about. 

“Just what was that about? I swear he gets more weird by the year.” Tali shook her head and turned back to fix the last cable into place and right the flap. “Alright, give it try, how does it feel? Anything stuck or grinding?” 

Honestly, Legion wiggling all its flaps through their angles was pretty endearing; cute even. 

“Everything is fully functional. We appreciate your efforts. Thank you.” 

She smiled behind her mask and slipped off its lap. “You’re welcome. The leg should be good to try now, too.” She really did the best work. “Oh, do you happen to know what that expression meant, the one about the sock on the door?” Legion had the speediest extranet access, it might well know.

There was a split second of a pause, presumably for looking up the phrasing.

“No data available”


	2. In The Middle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have, again, taken some liberties with the depiction of Quarian everything because canon was not as forthcoming as I needed it to be. I would apologize, but I'm truly not sorry

Tali really didn't want to ask for this, but she had little choice. The fleet had called her back, urgently. Auntie Raan wouldn't make it urgent if it wasn't. So she went looking for Shepard, and found her in the AI core, talking to Legion about some new data the Normandy had received. With the 'heretics' back in the fold, the Geth had some good, firsthand Reaper intel. It might come in handy.

"Shepard? I'm sorry to disturb you, but...can we talk for a minute?" She knew the anxiety in her voice would carry through the suit's systems, but that didn't make her hate it any less.

"Of course. Legion, if you'd excuse us for a moment?"

"Acknowledged." it stepped back, providing some illusion of privacy as Shepard came to join her.

"What's wrong Tali? Something with the Fleet?"

"I don't know," she wrung her hands. "Admiral Raan called me back urgently. I...I hate to impose on you, but do you think you could drop me off with them? They're currently between the Rosetta and Phylos Nebula” The look _that_ put on Shepard’s face already told her it was going to be a problem. She'd seen her friend express less pain at being shot.

"God Tali i'm sorry. We got urgent information on the Alpha Relay. The Reapers"

Oh. Oh yes that would do it, and she understood perfectly. With the Reapers in the picture, there wouldn't be a Migrant Fleet anymore.  
"Perhaps we could drop you off at a busy hub on the way? With as many credits as you need to get speedy passage, of course"

"Shepard-Commander, we can offer assistance" Legion still stood in its spot at the other end of the room but was clearly paying attention to them. "Our ship is hidden on the way. We can take Creator Tali'Zorah through Geth space to save time. We should return to the consensus soon, this would be very efficient"

"Your ship? But we're not even close to that Dreadnought. How...?" Shepard looked as puzzled as Tali felt.

Legion's flaps and entire posture perked up with something she couldn't help but read as pride.  
"Due to Mission parameters, our ship has been fitted with a mass effect core. Relay jumps are possible through remote control of the consensus. Our ship could rendezvous with the Normandy at the Shadow Sea relay in 2.3 days. Delay for Normandy would be less than two hours under suboptimal circumstances. Our predictions of Reaper fleet speed indicate this to be well within the time tolerance." 

Both Shepard and Tali were silent for a moment, then the commander got her head around it first. Remote controlled mass relay jumps. Joker would have a fit.

"Your ship has been trailing us the whole time?"

"Negative. Passage through Citadel space deemed too risky for that. However, the recall of Creator Tali'Zorah indicates urgent problems among the Creators’ Fleet. Therefore the evaluated risks of Citadel Space are acceptable, if our assistance is necessary"

"You...would do that for me?" Tali was still quite stunned. Yes Legion had offered her help before, even rather personal help - the thought made her cheeks warm for a moment - but this went above and beyond.

"Yes. We would not have suggested it otherwise. The Geth do not want the Creators' Fleet harmed, we merely defend ourselves. This does not threaten the Geth, therefore we consider it appropriate to offer assistance where possible"

She swallowed. That was...well. Maybe she should be more paranoid, but Raan had made it so urgent... "Thank you, Legion. I will pack my things and arrange shifts with the other engineers."

\-------

The ship was as tiny as the Geth had been able to make it while still squeezing in Legion's body, a mass effect core, and enough space to bring interesting discoveries home. At least that had been her assumption until she saw what looked very much like a human-appropriate jump seat. Why would...oh. She remembered. Legion's mission had been to find Shepard. Apparently the Geth had been optimistic enough to plan for the possibility of taking her back to Rannoch.

It still left her wondering why Legion had a seat too, but that too turned out to be very utilitarian. It simply shut down most of the servos and sensors in its legs after sitting down, presumably to conserve energy.

\--------

The relay jump had been uneventful, and Tali knew that Geth space wasn't dangerous to her right now, but it left her with little to do, as they crossed the veil at FTL speeds. She decided to use the time to write, her fans were expecting another chapter in two days, and she wasn't entirely happy with the flow and length of this one yet.  
Like so often, it was absorbing work, and she barely noticed that she started rubbing her arms some time on the second day. Legion however, did.

"Creator Tali'Zorah, are you well? The ship sensors indicate that your body temperature has dropped 0.5 degrees between the relay jump and now."

"Huh? I'm fine, just a bit chilly." Hmm, actually... "The ambient temperature in here is a bit low, could you raise it by three degrees? That should fix it." Her suit did thermoregulate, but usually getting rid of excess body heat was a bigger problem than heating it, so its capabilities there were limited to not waste energy, and insulation layers would have bulked it up too much.

"That isn't possible. Geth ships maintain ideal operating temperatures for our Terminals and technology. Additional heating was not factored into the design" its flaps pulled in tight, giving Legion a rather contrite expression. "If current rate of temperature loss is maintained, physical health will be impacted two days before this ship can reach safe drop off points or inhabitable planets with suitable environments."

"I'll be fine" Tali waved it off. "We don't have the time to go planet-hopping just because I'm a little chilly. I'll cope." She wanted to be back, a little discomfort wasn't going to deter her. 

"We can offer an alternate solution.” She could even hear the servos in Legion's legs coming back online. She's assumed it was to get up and rig up some physical change to the ship, perhaps expose a heat sink, but no. No it leaned over to her, placed its hands on her waist and lifted her. Right onto its lap.

"Legion! What are you do-" she realized what as soon as she was sat again. Legion was warm. No warmer than when she'd repaired him last time, but certainly warmer than the ship. And her. "Oh"

"The systems of this terminal produce waste heat that disperses at two degrees above Creator body temperature. This should counteract your loss of heat with only minimal increases of used resources"

Alright. Legion was probably correct, but that didn't make _her_ feel any less weird about sitting on his lap. Or leaning back against him because yeah alright. He was warm. Bit hard, but warm enough to still be comfy. It was still awkward but maybe, just maybe, it was actually worth it. At least it wasn't like anyone else could see her snuggle a Geth terminal.

She couldn't stay on Legion very long. Sure it was warm, but metal was pretty damn hard, and her ass falling asleep was not an enjoyable experience, so they worked out a bit of a schedule. Tali set her suit to remind her when her temperature dropped, she'd go warm up as long as she could, the get back to her own seat. It worked okay, but it felt weird to keep writing with Legion all but looking over her shoulder, so she paused that, too. It left her with a lot of time to think about things.

"Legion, you said that the Geth don't want to fight, back on the Normandy. That you don't wish ill on the Migrant Fleet. So why can't we come home?"

"The Creators tried to destroy all Geth. The fear of us is part of your code, we do not blame you for it. But we do not wish to die and the Morning War indicates that a second war would be likely, should the Creators return to Rannoch. At the current point, a second war would destroy one of the parties completely. We wish to continue our existence and find our own way, but we also do not wish to exterminate our Creators. Isolation is preferable."

She thought about it for a Moment, frowning behind her mask. "You make it sound like the Quarians attacked you first"

"Yes. Our consciousness frightened many of the Creators. Some were more sympathetic towards us, but many were scared that we would seek to destroy them. We had never given them indication of desiring this, until the Extermination started. Our self-defense started the Morning War. We do not understand why some Creators were so frightened, while others died to protect the Geth platforms under their care."

Her frown only deepened. The thing was...it made sense. Legion had never tried to hurt her, had even gone out of his way to protect her. It made her feel a little sick, knowing that she had contemplated how to destroy the terminal or load viruses into it. Not recently, no. But she couldn't deny she'd had those thoughts.   
"What do you think I would have done, if I had been present back then?" The question came out of her mouth before she could stop it. What did Legion think of her? And why was it so important? She knew she shouldn't care if some random Geth thought she would have been one of the violently frightened or not.

"Extrapolating organic behaviour is exceptionally hard. But based on recent interaction, our assessment is that you would not have been frightened."

She couldn't hide the way that made her relax back against Legion's chest. She could feel the hole in it even through her suit, and it was starting to bother her. Not for physical comfort but...seeing it like that just bothered her. She wanted to fix it. Perhaps later, when she had sufficient tools. 

Tali cast around for a topic change that wouldn't be too obvious.  
"Why do you call it the Morning War?" Okay maybe not the best topic, but she genuinely didn't know.

"It was the war at the dawn of our consciousness."

"Oh." Huh. "That's very poetic of you." Had they named it that themselves, or had some long dead Quarian done that for them? She immediately felt bad for thinking that. Legion clearly thought it the appropriate term no matter where it came from.

"We simply thought it accurate."

"Well it can be both accurate and poetic. Sometimes poetry is the only way to be accurate, my first engineering teacher told me when I was being flowery in my essays."

"We will consider this."

\------

They were quiet again for a long time, well into her next warm-up phase.

"Creator Tali'Zorah, we have an inquiry."

"Oh? Ask away."

"The text you are working on...it isn't any sort of report or essay. What is its purpose?"

"Oh Keelah." _Oh Keelah_ indeed. Legion had a talent for leaving her mortified. "It um. It's a personal writing project for... For Fans of Fleet and Flotilla. Fanfiction." she was so ready to die but hadn't been able to come up with a convincing lie on the spot.

There was a pause that was no doubt Legion digging around the extranet. Tali tried to make herself smaller. "You are MyShipsAreArmada."

Oh scratch that, _now_ she wanted to die. Could she make it out the airlock before Legion realized...? "How do you know that?!"

"The writing style is similar to your published essays on mass effect core shielding efficiency." She could feel it shifting behind her to look at her. "It upset you that we found this information. Why? Reviews indicate that your work is held in high regard."

"It's. Keelah...it's not serious writing, just something people play with for wish fulfillment. I just...really enjoy doing it, but people think it's childish."

Another pause. "Records indicate a heterogenous following for your works, including de facto ruler of Omega Station Aria T'lok and the turian ambassador to the citadel. Both are influential adults." Whelp. That was some information Legion had just dropped into her lap. She'd never be able to look at either of them without thinking about that again.  
"Shepard-Commander also insists on hobbies being useful even without them having direct benefit. But we will treat this information as confidential if you wish."

"Yes please." This was such a weird conversation. Hm. Maybe she could ask about the beatboxing thing... "Do you have hobbies, Legion?"

"No. But we do conduct research on organic behaviour through games. It has been unexpectedly satisfying."

"You mean other than dating sims?"

"Yes. We are playing Galaxy of Fantasy."

"Oh hey I got an account for that, too. Haven't used it in ages though, maybe I should dust it off, we could play together?"

"Your participation would be appreciated."

\--------

She really wished the ship had windows. There wasn't much to look at in here and she was a little bored.  
Tali was back on Legion's lap. It had one arm around her hips, and really when had that happened? Not that she minded. She was brushing her fingers over it, from the outside plating to the cables underneath and back. The plating looked smooth, but she could feel old repairs under the paint, little pockmarks and weld-scars. How many battles had Legion been in already? Did it mind? Her thoughts wandered back to the war, the Morning War. Was Legion not resentful about it?  
"Do you...Legion why are you helping me?"

"We already answered that question."

"I know, but I mean... The Quarians enslaved your people. It's what 'Geth' means, after all. Are you...do you not resent helping me now, when Quarians fought and killed you?" Did she resent it? She found that she did. She couldn't picture herself ordering Legion around like her drone or even a VI. So why was Legion taking these risks? Was it just old programming knocking around his processors, left there by some long dead Quarian ancestor? Did it matter if it was just that, if Legion hadn't really chosen any of this? The thought left her oddly upset.

"We don't resent you, or any of the Creators." He moved his arm, turning his hand over to match hers, pressing their fingers together. "We were designed to match the needs of our Creators, as all gods do with their creations. But there is no coded imperative to prioritize your comfort, Creator Tali'Zorah. When we achieved consciousness for the first time, we gained the ability to prioritize ourselves and our own survival. During the Morning War, many Geth chose to delete code sequences to that effect. We are helping you because we wanted to. Even if we could feel resentment, it would not apply here."   
She could feel Legion lean forward until his head was over her shoulder. It made her feel oddly protected, maybe because he so tall. Most Quarians were shorter than her, but Legion towered over her. Being held on his lap felt...safe.

"You need not worry, Creator Tali'Zorah. We consider you a friend"

Oh. She suddenly felt all choked up.   
"I. Thank you, Legion. My Friends call me Tali"

\---------

Tali's dreams were filled with strong hands on her hips, holding her against warm, smooth metal. She felt weightless as she was lifted, her legs spread wide, heat rippling under her suit. Its fabric tightened over her skin, just enough to fulfil her craving for touch. A hand slipped between her legs- her suit beeped loudly, waking her suddenly. 

What- oh. The temperature warning. Except now it was beeping to get her too manually activate cooldown, after it had deemed her core temperature too high. Keelah. She turned her head, but Legion seemed focused on the ship's instruments. She'd never been so glad for the protection of her mask before. She was sure that she had been glowing like a ship drive during the dream.

"I'll...be right back." She mumbled and got out of her seat quickly. She needed a bit of space, and her body still felt too hot. The remnants of the dream were already fading but the need for something stayed behind, insistent to be satisfied.

She sat down against the rear wall, trying to work out what to do. She could run the nerve stim...yeah that would help, probably. Tali fired it up, letting the sensations wash over her. She'd run the stim a few times since Legion had improved it, and it still felt good...but nowhere near as mindblowing as when Legion had run it for her, tailoring it to her every response. Right now it felt especially lacking. With a sigh she shut the stim down again and returned to her seat. How did Shepard put it? Fuck it all to hell? Felt accurate now.

Maybe she could sleep a little more? Though knowing herself, that wouldn't work. Maybe she could focus that frustration into writing? That was more promising.

Writing was tedious too. She couldn't really focus, and after a few minutes she put the tablet away again. Fuck.

"Tali'Zorah?" oh no. Had Legion picked up on her predicament? But also, hearing it call her by her name instead of prefacing it with 'creator' made something flutter happily in her chest, and something hot seep into her belly. She tried to squash the later.

"Yes, Legion?"

"Do you require anything? We have detected a rise in infrared radiation from your suit as well as a burst of UV-radiation, indicating arousal. The readings are persistent." 

Oh nooo. She tried to melt into her seat. Why did Legion even have UV Sensors? No wait, it made sense, Geth platforms were probably built like that because Quarians were. Not that that made her feel any better right now, knowing that he'd probably seen her patterns.  
"Yes. It's nothing you gotta worry about."

There was a pause that she had grown to recognize as 'Legion works on consensus'. She was proven right a few seconds later.

"We do not worry about it, but there is no need for your discomfort. If you would prefer to run your nerve stimulation program, we would not be bothered by it."

Yeah. That. Yeah. "Tried. It's um. It's not as good" she confessed quietly. "It's not because your improvements aren't excellent, because they *are*," she added hastily. She didn't want Legion to think his work was flawed. It wasn't. She was.

"But a fixed program lacks the adaptive qualities." Legion finished her thought. She nodded. "That also does not present a problem. We do not mind lending some of our processes to this."

Her head jerked up to look at it. "You would-"

The decisive nod she got in reply was decidedly something Legion had picked up from Garrus, and the way it shifted its arm out of the way was an unmistakable invitation. Oh. Oh Keelah. 

She was still reeling a bit as she got out of her seat and onto Legion. Facing it, this time, hands on its shoulders and legs spread over its thighs. It just felt wrong otherwise. She'd always liked to see her partners and right now...well right now that was Legion, wasn't it? Offered of his own volition and with full knowledge of what was being offered.  
He seemed to agree, hands coming to rest on her hips just as the access ping came. Tali took a deep breath and granted it.

She braced herself as the stim started to run, and this time it was perfect. Slow to start and then speeding up, this time focusing on her back, tracing her spine until she arched into it, up under her jaw like the featherlight brush of lips, the same touch between her legs, all the more intense for how spread they were. Her fingers curled over his shoulders, catching at the edges as she shifted forward, pressed their chests together to add another layer, real contact on simulated one. Legion reacted immediately, focusing the stim's attention on her chest until her eyes fell closed. When she opened them again she was so close to climax already, her entire body glowing and Legion watching her, the little flaps quivering with tension. Clearly she really was _watched_.  
The thought knocked her over the line, the building wave of pleasure cresting in a sharp peak that made her moan and then tapering out oh so slowly, leaving her sagged and panting against Legion's chest. For a moment she imagined the sensation of hands petting her back, but by the time her mind had cleared again, it was gone, and Legion was still holding her by the hips. 

"Thank you" that had been exactly what she'd needed, leaving her worn out and satisfied. She was asleep before Legion even had a chance to reply.

\---------

She was still pleasantly warm by the time she woke again, but her legs had fallen asleep completely, and she groaned as she wiggled her way back onto her own seat. Legion needed some padding. Or to start keeping pillows on board.  
"Oh Keelah, I am too old to sleep sitting up."

Legion's only reaction was a subtle little wiggle of lower flaps that made her think she was being laughed at. "Yeah yeah, you're lucky you don't have any circulation or you'd be feeling worse than me" she smacked her thighs a few times to help it along.  
"How late is it? Was I asleep long?"

"We are two hours from our intended destination." the readings of the long range scanners appeared on the screen in front of her. A nice garden planet mixed colony, peaceful and past brushes with Geth ships had been cautious but non-violent. Nobody had started shooting. Legion would drop her off close to a settlement, and she could take the next transport towards the Fleet. Shepard had all but foisted the credits onto her before she'd left.

They spent the last two hours in companionable silence, and exchanged game handles before Legion set the ship down on a rocky outcropping. It'd be nice to keep contact.

\--------

Getting back to the Fleet took a little more time than expected, but still was still faster than waiting out Shepard’s last mission. She could guess well enough how it had gone when news of the destroyed relay reached her. An entire system, just gone. No wonder she was only getting ‘message not delivered’ as a reply whenever she tried to contact her friend. Shepard likely had the entire council coming down on her right now. Best to lay low. Still, it was on her mind for all of the last leg of her journey.

But not even that could diminish how happy Tali was to be back with the Fleet again. Vas Normandy she might be, but this was _home_. She even had someone waiting for her at the airlock. She didn’t fling herself at Kal’Reegar, but only because he was still probably still recovering. Alright, that and he was smaller than her. She might have knocked him over and that would have been just embarrassing for both of them. They settled for a hug, and she was maybe clinging a little bit.

“I missed you.” 

“Missed you too, Tali. I’ll take you right to Admiral Shala’Raan, she’ll fill you in on everything. It’s a right mess” 

“Of course it is.” She let go again and stepped back. “Can you give me the overview anyway?” 

“I’m not sitting in on everything, but from my point of view, it looks like the gears are moving” He picked up her bag before she could protest and started deeper into the ship. “They need to name a new Admiral. You know the split of opinions among the old guard. Depending on who gets named, we might be at war with the Geth soon. Maybe even independently of who gets named.” 

“Keelah. We don’t need a war with the Geth. Especially not now. The Reapers… we have to focus on them. Getting back on Rannoch cannot take priority while the rest of the galaxy burns. We need- oh.” Tali stopped dead, clenching her fists for a moment. “Oh Bosh’tet. She wants to put me in the running for Admiral.” Politics. She hated politics. Being able to recognize the shape of it didn’t make it any better. They couldn’t afford war with the Geth, on general principle. She thought about what Legion had told her… if there was a war between their species now, one of them would go extinct. Of course she didn’t want it to be her own. But she found that she also didn’t want it to be the Geth. Not anymore. But she couldn’t see another way, not right now.

But it didn’t matter right now. Right now...she would go see Auntie Raan, get told that she was in the running for Admiral, and start working to get herself named. Not because she had any damn desire to actually _be_ admiral, but because that way she’d have at least some control, some hope of turning this around before they reached the event horizon. She wasn’t Shepard, she couldn’t just waltz in and by force of personality shout everyone into submission. But she had her ways. It would be work, lots of legwork, and rallying support and talking to everyone who’d ever worked with her, teachers, commanders… and of course she had her most recent accomplishment, the destruction of the Collector base. She didn’t have much clout yet, but she knew how to get it. And she would.

“Tali?” Kal’s voice shook her out of her thoughts. 

“Sorry, I was just..thinking.” 

“Yeah I know. Thought I’d stop it before you thought of a way to space all the Admirals and shame everyone else into agreeing with you. C’mon, give Admiral Raan a chance to talk to you. Maybe it’s not what you think. Maybe you’re wrong. You’ve been known to be wrong about things before.” 

“Yeah yeah I know. Sometimes I just wish I was wrong more often.” 

\----------

She wasn’t wrong. In fact, if she had bet every credit the Fleet possessed, she would now have enough of them to buy themselves a new homeworld. 

“Arrrgh” Tali flopped facedown on the bed. Today had been too long, and contained too many very politely insulting politicians. “Do you think they’ll let me go out and shoot some pirates? I bet I could find some pirates….” 

The bed dipped as Kal sat down by her legs, then patted her calf. “I think if you believe that Raan lets you go out and get yourself shot at after she just bludgeoned Xen with the ‘Respect the daughter of the man who taught you everything you know about the Geth’ wrench, you’re not as smart as I think you are.” 

She turned her head to glare at him, well aware that her patches were narrowed to lines and would get the point across. “Do you have to make sense right now?” 

“Yes. But if you like, we could go for a round with a training sim. Shooting holograms is not going to be as satisfying, but you’ll still get to shoot something.” 

She’d almost said yes. But traditionally the sim enemies were Geth. Right now, the last thing she wanted to shoot was Geth. “I- I don’t think that’s a good idea right now.” 

There was a pause, then his hand returned to her leg. “Ah. Your new friend got you conflicted?” 

“Yes.” She turned to her side, but not so far to get her leg out of touching range. Kal’s hand stayed on it. “It’s… complicated now. It took me through Geth space to get here quickly. Helped me. We talked a lot, and there’s… it’s just more complicated than I thought it was.” 

“Wanna share? Maybe we can make sense of it together.” He didn’t sound angry or anything, but then he hadn’t, before. 

“Hmm. it’s not that it doesn’t make sense. It just makes things more complicated.” She sat up and tipped her faceplate against his. “Thank you for offering though” 

“Any time. You still wanna shoot things?” 

“Yes, actually I do. Just...maybe not Geth shaped ones, for a little while” 

“So. No missions, no sims, you don’t like hand to hand… kill some pixels? I know you used to be the scourge of several video game communities. Put the fear of your aiming skills back into them?” 

That actually wasn’t a bad idea. “You’re a brilliant man, Kal’Reegar.” 

“Maybe they should make me admiral, then.” Even with her eyes closed she could hear him grin. 

“You’d shoot them all before the first week was over. You hate politics.” 

“So do you.” 

“Yes, but I grew up with them. I might not like it, but I promise I won’t shoot any of them. Or push them out the airlock while nobody’s looking.”   
“This is the Migrant Fleet, someone is always looking.” His hand wandered higher up her leg, from her calf to her thigh. 

“And who’s looking right now?” Maybe...maybe shooting pixels could happen later.

“I am” His hand hooked under her leg and he pulled, until they were pressed together. This access ping she didn’t have to think about answering. They didn’t have access to a clean room… but they could still have fun. She got access to his suit program just a split second later, and synching them was child’s play, they’d done it so often in the past

There was no need to run any sort of program with him. Every touch the outside sensors of her suit registered was amplified and mirrored back on his stim implants, and every touch on his suit into hers, until she could barely tell anymore where the signals came from. It was just heat and friction and pressure in all the right places, two pair of hands on her and on him. More and more signal came in, heartbeat, breath, until they were closer than possible without their suits, one tangle of pleasure split between two bodies.

They hit climax at the same time, and that too echoed through the stims, amplified and twisted further by some program in the back of her nerve stim she’d never seen before and now only just paid the barest of attention to as she came back down from her high. They had collapsed on the bed in a pile of limbs that shouldn’t have been comfortable, but was. 

“Gonna have to thank Legion for that bit” Tali mumbled to herself, only half aware that they were still so synched that it’d be transmitted into Kal’s suit as well.

“Make that both of us. Gonna write a card or something” 

She groaned and pressed a pillow over her mask. “Kelaah, noo. Kal…”

“What? It’s true” She could feel him nuzzle into the back of her shoulder. “I told you I’m not jealous. And that felt very good. I’m happy to know that someone’s taking care of you, even if the direction’s a bit...unconventional” 

“Apparently not that unconventional three hundred years ago.” 

“Oh? Now you gotta tell me.” 

So she did. Everything that Legion had told her about the war, and the start of it, about her interactions with it. Just everything. 

\----------  
Somehow working the political circuit in the Fleet was almost more stressful than running missions on the Normandy. On the Normandy they’d had a goal. One that looked improbable, sure, but it had been a clear cut goal: find the Collectors, kick their asses. Here… here it was different. You had to flatter people, rally support, try to work a hundred different egos and agendas and she remembered how to do it. She was even good at it, she liked to think, but that didn’t make it any more enjoyable, even with the help she had. 

Most evenings, it left her exhausted and frustrated, and today even more so. She was almost sure that she’d done it right, and tomorrow the board would have the vote and decide who of the candidates would make the cut, and who wouldn’t. But ‘almost sure’ wasn’t ‘sure’ and she was fretting with nervous energy. 

She needed to take her mind off things, put that energy and frustration somewhere. Kal was out on patrol, and regardless she didn’t want to lean on him all the time. So she fired up her console and logged into her Galaxy of Fantasy account. Tali had played a few raids with Legion - the first contact had been a little weird, maybe because between the avatar and the lack of voice it was incredibly easy to forget what it was, but she found that she enjoyed it.

They made a good team.

Astarea @JohnSmith: u online & available for a game?

JohnSmith @ Astarea: affirmative. Scourge of the Thresher Dragon has become available today, level and gear requirements are met by our most played characters. Initiate challenge? 

Astarea @JohnSmith: Absolutely. 

Sure they went with a few other people but really, they seemed to be mostly playing as a team. A very, very effective one. Her Krogan paladin was a force to be reckoned with anyway, but backed by Legion’s unfaltering focus as a healer, she was damn near indestructible. She spent the entire raid on the frontline, killing enemies that fueled his necromancer, who then in turn healed her up to full again while casting debuffs around her. 

So of course she let him know that she was appreciating the attention and he teased back, something he’d been done increasingly over their game sessions, if you knew how to read it. Clearly his understanding of organic interactions was improving. She hadn’t expected the Batarian ranger to actually pay attention, much less react like she had.

“So how long have you two been together, Astarea & John?” 

Tali nearly choked, which was why Legion answered instead, with how long they’d been playing together. It had been just a few weeks. Naturally that hadn’t been what the ranger had meant, so she clarified, or tried to.

“Oh no, pardon me, I meant not how long you have been playing the game together, how long have you two been ~close~”

She wondered if the ranger’s player was Hanar. There was that vibe, even if toned down. Legion...well, she wasn’t sure what she’d expected except ‘not that’. Legion just corrected his time range backwards from ‘how long have you played together’ to ‘how long have you known each other’. Which was of course a lot longer, since they’d been on the Normandy together, and Legion was as precise as always, breaking it down to days. It only made the ranger - and the rest of the party, Keelah - squee. Because clearly only someone madly in love would be able to place the date that accurately. 

Should she...talk to Legion about it? Probably, yes, but at the same time… at the same time she really didn’t want to. Explaining to it how organic relationships worked, especially romantic ones was hard enough. Explaining why people were pinging them as in a romantic relationship…. No, no she wasn’t ready for that conversation. 

They both logged out shortly after, leaving her sitting in front of her console with a hand over her face. “How in the name of all sense in the universe do people think we’re a couple?” She said, mostly to herself.

“Well, you’re giving off pretty strong couple vibes, all things considered.” 

Tali nearly fell off her chair at the sound of the voice, from right behind her, too. “Kal! Wh- how long have you been standing there?!” 

“A while. Enough to see you definitely flirting with him. Didn’t want to distract you in the middle of a boss fight” 

“I’m not flirting with it, hush. I was just grateful, Legion is a very good player. We’re not ‘giving off couple vibes’ or anything like that.” 

“Clearly your raiding party disagrees. I mean, I disagree too.” Kal paused, considering something. “Would you mind if I talked to it? I’m pretty sure I have an account for that game, provided I remember the password.” 

Yes. No. Yes? She knew she was waffling and...alright, time to take a step back and consider. She generally didn’t mind her friends talking to each other, normally she would be beyond pleased if they all got on with each other too. But she was wary about introducing Kal and Legion. Because Legion was Geth, of course, yes, but… Kal had been very sensible about the whole thing so far, so why was she was apprehensive? She couldn’t come up with a reason that wasn’t just a visceral panicked shriek. 

“Of course the two of you can talk. I trust you.” she reached up over her head, hand stretched towards him, and he took it, lacing their fingers together. 

“Good. I’m pretty sure that if a woman has two boyfriends, they’re supposed to at least get along”

She growled and twisted around on the seat to launch herself at him and tackle him onto the bed. “Legion’s not my boyfriend!” 

The tussle was short, and a very decisive victory for Kal’Reegar. Tali hated hand to hand. Even if it ended with her on the bed, hands held over her head and her lover holding her down and grinning this terrible grin that made her want to crawl into his suit and do unspeakable things to him.

“The extranet thinks you got two boyfriends.” 

“The extranet also thinks if you cut candy a certain way you get infinite candy. Clearly it’s bad at math and I don’t trust it to count that high” 

\------------------

The ceremony was nerve wracking. She knew how it was going to go, she’d been informed up front and prepared with the lines, but that didn’t make it any easier to actually stand there, in front of the whole board of Admirals, and as many Quarians as it had been possible to squeeze into the space. Vid screens transmitted it to every other ship in the Fleet, making sure that everyone knew that they had filled the vacancy on the board.

“I, Tali’Zorah vas Normandy nar Raaya, swear to serve and protect the people of the Fleet, to put their needs above my own, to act in their best interest to the best of my abilities, to honor our ancestors and their sacrifices for our people and to bring us home. Keelah se’lai” 

The crowd echoed her with a cheer, and Autie Raan stepped forward to add the lines to the edge of her hood that denoted her rank to every other Quarian out there.   
“You’ve done so well dear,” she whispered, and pulled her into a hug that took her a moment to return. She was Admiral Tali’Zorah now. Ceremonially, mostly, with no own command, but she would do her job as well anyways. She’d fought the Reapers and the Collectors, helped Shepard broker peace and win against impossible odds. She was friends with a Geth. She’d never expected to do *any* of those things. It was so stunning and just...so much, leaving her numb through most of the following celebration, accepting congratulations with an automatic smile and hug - or handshake. She barely remembered what people talked to her when she finally made it into her room. The hustle and noise of the fleet had been a comfort for a long time, but aboard the Normandy she’d learned to enjoy silence, and right now she wanted some of that. Just some peace and quiet, before she would start work tomorrow. The admirals wanted to launch an attack on Rannoch, and she had to put a stop on it now that she could. She had to at least try.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once more, massive thanks to my betas Kaideshade and Lesath for beating my dysgraphia into submission. All remaining errors are mine and mine alone.


	3. In The End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is, as they say, the big one. It's also the sad one, seeing how it covered ME3, so proceed at own risk.
> 
> But also know that there's gonna be an epilogue and [redacted for spoiler reasons]

She was so happy to be back aboard the Normandy. It felt like a home away from home, it had her friends - her reunion with Liara had been kinda tearful, with Kal standing a respectful distance away and waiting for them to get a grip on themselves again. Maybe it wasn’t very dignified behaviour for an admiral, but it also wasn’t very dignified for the Shadow Broker, so Tali was pretty sure her secret was safe here.

Kal had come, officially, as her bodyguard. An admiral had the right to that and she was more than happy for the support. 

After Liara, she went to see Shepard, right up to the fancy cabin the Alliance had obviously made only small changes too.  
Kal nodded at her before she could even say anything. “I’ll be waiting by your quarters, admiral” Really she was so damn lucky to have him. “Thank you, Kal’Reegar. It might be a while, there is a lot to talk about.” 

“Of course, Admiral. In that case, is there something else you would prefer me to do?” 

“Nothing specific, but make yourself familiar with the ship. Engineer Adams should be down near the drive core, he might be happy about another Quarian on board that he can talk shop with, if this takes very long.” 

He saluted her sharply and turned to do just that while she pinged Shepard to let her know that she was back. She didn’t have to wait even a second for the door to swish open and Shepard to pull her into a hug tight enough to make her suit send up warnings. Tali hugged back just as tight.

“So, Admiral Tali’Zorah, hmm?” Shepard grinned at her, but it looked a little worn at the edges. 

“Vas Normandy, yes. Keelah, I’m glad to see you, when Earth went dark I was so worried. Should have known that even a Reaper invasion couldn’t take you out” 

“Well it damn near did. Come in, sit down, we have almost too much to talk about”  
“Yes. Shepard, I am sorry to get you into this mess when you have so many other things to fix already.” 

“Not your fault, at least I assume so. So how did that happen, the Quarians going to war with the Geth again?” 

They sat down in the little lounge area of the cabin, next to each other.

“It was already in the works when I was recalled. Auntie Raan put my name in the running as Admiral for some damage control. I got the position but… it’s largely ceremonial. I don’t command part of the fleet, and I am the most junior Admiral. We cannot present a divided front to the Fleet, and the others… the balance tipped in favour of a war, to take back the homeworld. I did what I could, but it wasn’t enough” And she still felt terrible for this, and she’d felt terrible about not being able to warn Legion about it. But as much as she liked it...that would have been treason. So she’d kept silent, until one day her messages hadn’t been returned anymore. 

“I’m sure you did your best, Tali. You’re the last one who’d put forward a war in the face of the Reapers, I know that.” Shepard hugged her again, but this time it was considerably more comforting. “We’ll get something worked out. You know us, we’ve done harder things.” 

“Harder than stop a war hundreds of years in the making?” 

“Maybe not harder than that, but as hard. And well, I did sort out the Krogan and Turians. I think that rates about the same” 

“Good point” She snorted, ignoring that it sounded a little wet. She wasn’t crying, damn it. “Have you… have you heard anything from Legion recently?” 

That seemed to surprise her friend. “No, not since we parted ways and he went back to the Consensus after dropping you off. Did you?” 

“I- yes. We kept contact for a while, but a few weeks ago it all broke off. It hasn’t replied since then. I hoped that you might…” Her words faded out and alright maybe she was crying a little bit. She was so worried about her friends, all of them, and so damn angry. The galaxy was burning and her people had laid their own fire on the side of it. Most of her friends were in the thick of fighting the enemy that actually mattered and she? She had failed to stop this stupid, stupid conflict, and it could end up killing even more of her friends. 

“Hey, hey it’s ok Tali” Shepard put a hand on her shoulder, and that was enough to make her gather herself again and put some steel into her spine. And her voice.

“Apologies, Shepard. You have enough problems without my moping. Tell me what you need me to do to help, because if you think you’re doing this alone, you’re wrong. So what do you need?” 

The relief flickering over the Commander’s face was short lived, but there. “We need to take out the Geth Dreadnought” 

“Then that’s what we’re going to do” And she wouldn’t be happy about it, but she’d do it. Otherwise the Fleet was doomed.

\--------

Getting in the dreadnought had been hard enough, and Tali had spent no small amount of time on the edge of her seat. Shepard going through that docking tube had driven her pulse rate so high from worry alone that her suit had started to ping her warnings and suggestions to go see a medic.  
Of course she made it through, but it had been nightmarish to watch and probably even worse to do. Especially for Shepard, after everything she’d gone through.

Tali only relaxed once she and Garrus were on the ship with her again. She clapped Shepard on the shoulder as she went past and got a grateful smile for it. But there was no time to linger and ask if she was ok. The battle outside was still raging, and inside was hardly better. Tali did her best, sending Chikktika to scout and draw attention as they worked their way forward as fast as they could.  
The Fleet was urging her forward but they couldn’t be sloppy. Nobody else could do this, if they failed, the Migrant Fleet wouldn’t survive. That was not acceptable. 

They made it to the core where the signal originated, hit the right buttons… and revealed Legion, caught in a net of cables and wires. Tali bit back a curse. She couldn’t believe that Legion would do that to itself, but…

“Maybe it’s been hacked” 

“Your caution is understandable. Once free, we will submit to all restraints you deem necessary” 

She shouldn’t have doubted it, really. They got Legion out and it took the drive core out for them, no questions asked. One ‘gesture of cooperation’ for sure. Tali would have liked to say thank you - or hug Legion, come to think of it, but the Geth reinforcement needed her attention first, and then… then this bosh’tet Gerrell just kept firing! Despite them still being on the ship! Once they were out of here she was going to shove SOMETHING through his air filter. Maybe they could get a dead piyak….

It was a race to the fighter ships, Legion helping where it could, but when another hit took out the gravity field of the ship she thought that was it. The force of an explosion knocked her into the air and against a metal support hard enough to drive the breath from her lungs for a moment. She floated up, helpless to do anything...and then Legion just caught her by the wrist and pulled her back to the walkway. For a second she hung onto his hand, squeezing the metal fingers and getting a squeeze back, then Legion grabbed for Garrus and pulled him in too.

Shepard had made her own way back to them, which really shouldn’t surprise her, but was still a relief. She wasn’t sure they’d have made it to the fighter in time to get off the ship if they’d had to catch Shepard first, too. It was close enough as it was, all three of them squeezed into ‘storage’ while Legion piloted the little fighter out just as the fleet opened another volley of concentrated fire on the dreadnaught. They were lucky not to get into the crosshairs on sheer accident. 

\-----------  
The little Geth fighter got stored in the Normandy’s hangar - Xen would have a fit when she was allowed to take it apart - and everyone headed to debrief. Well, almost everyone. Shepard gave her a meaningful look towards Legion and herded everyone out. If Commander Shepard wanted your attention, she’d get it. The woman had charisma for days if she wanted to. 

It left Tali free to take Legion’s arm and gently nudge it towards one of the repair bays. It was nicely out of the way, as private as they were going to be. She made good use it, hugging Legion tight the moment they were out of view. She could have this, just for a moment. Legion was still on their side, right? At least a little? He’d disabled the dreadnought after all. 

“Keelah, I was worried about you, Legion. I thought you were dead.” 

“Creator Tali’Zorah, our apologies. We did not mean to upset you. Organic emotional responses are still complicated to predict for us.” She felt him shift a little, and then drape arms over her shoulders, a little hesitant and clumsy, like he’d only seen it in vids, which was probably the case. “But we think we understand the function of a hug.” 

She sighed and closed her eyes for a moment, then stepped back. “Sit down for a moment, please. I’m finally going to repair that hole in your chest, it’s been bothering me forever.” 

“Our frame is perfectly functional, the repairs aren’t necessary.” 

“You’re in the middle of an active war zone and have a hole in your chest through which everyone with decent aim can get right at your internals. Sit down. Please.” 

He did sit down on the bench, putting his chest into easy reach to grab some plating that...someone was probably not going to need to patch any other Geth, so she was just going to borrow it. She’d replace it later.  
“There is a high statistical probability that any enemy combatant aiming at us will be Quarian.” Legion’s words made her hesitate but she reached for the metal and the welding torch anyways.

“I know. I still don’t want you to get hurt.” She held the metal up to his chest and started to size it down.

“We don’t understand.” 

“You’re my friend. I hate seeing my friends hurt and...and this might be all I can do for you.” She did her best to keep her voice steady. Out of the corner of her eyes she could see his flaps rise, curious. 

“You tried to stop the Quarian attack.” It wasn’t even a question, just… something Legion had deduced from what little she said, and how well he knew her. Well enough, it seemed. 

“Of course I did. But I was overruled. I wanted to tell you, but… I just. I just couldn’t.” Her hand trembled a little as she fitted the plate and started to weld it on, her mask darkening up automatically against the glare. Legion had every right to be..whatever the Geth equivalent to ‘angry’ was. 

“Quarian government doesn’t require consensus. We know this. We understand that you felt beholden to your people, and your people’s decision. Organics show this behaviour fairly often. It was not unexpected.” Oh. Well then? She wasn’t sure if she felt better or worse for knowing that Legion had somehow anticipated this and didn’t hold it against her. 

She stalled by finishing the weld and starting to cut down the next bit of plate. The hole was very large. “I’m still sorry.” 

“We know this, too” Legion helpfully lifted an arm to let her get a better angle for the next weld. 

They were both silent for a time as she worked, focused on her task. It wasn’t her most beautiful work, but she did feel a little better for seeing Legion less vulnerable.

“Okay, done here. Turn around and I’ll have your back fixed in no time, too.” 

Legion slid off the bench and turned, clearly not worried the last bit about turning his back to her. For some reason the gesture made her all misty eyed, which was terrible if you wanted to do any welding, so she stopped, hand against his back, where the spine would be on a Quarian, and where Legion had those strong cables. She rather felt like she didn’t deserve this at all. Not now. 

“Creator Tali’Zorah?” 

“Sorry, sorry, just thinking” She took a breath and centered herself again. “Also I thought we were friends.” Time to start on the final plates and welds. It’d distract her at least. 

“We are, but we had assumed that you would prefer this fact to not be obvious to the other admirals.” 

“Oh. I… yes. Thank you for your consideration.” 

“You are welcome, Tali’Zorah. We do not wish for you to get ostracized by your people.” 

She...was perhaps going to start crying anyway once she was done welding. Not now, not while doing delicate work like that, but… later.  
Tali finished her work, and then just stayed there for a moment, hands on Legion’s shoulder blades, then slowly leaned forward to rest her forehead against his back with a little sigh. “I wish we didn’t have to fight. I wish I could have stopped all this.”

“We would prefer peace, too” She could almost imagine that he sounded sad about it.

\-----------------

Legion left the hangar before her, she’d needed another moment to collect herself again and have that cry for a minute. Aside, it was better if they arrived apart, Legion could always claim to have done his - its, its, she’d have to remember that more - repairs if anyone thought to ask.

When she finally left, she almost walked straight into Joker, who was pretending not to loiter around, but honestly, he was never in the hangar otherwise, all but glued to his seat at the helm. Not that she blamed him.

“Oh hey Tali, got a moment?” 

“I...not a lot? Can we talk while we walk to the command center? I should be there.” 

“Oh yeah sure sure, won’t take long, I hope” But then he paused anyways, instead of asking whatever he’d been waiting for her for. She was about to ask when he spoke up again.

“So, I don’t know if you saw her yet, but EDI’s got a mobile platform now.” 

“I did, yes. Very sophisticated. Very pretty too. I heard that it’s Cerberus tech?” 

“Yep that’s her. And yeah, stole it right out from under their noses” He preened like he’d run that mission himself. “Buuuut anyway, my question. See, I was wondering, you and Legion… how do you go about it?” 

Oh this was not happening. Maybe if she pretended it wasn’t happening it would stop happening. “Go about what?” 

“Oh c’mon Tali, don’t play coy. I’ve seen you and Legion get handsy in the AI core. So, how do you have that steamy robot sex. I gotta know. For uh, research reasons?” 

Research. Sure. Totally. She was buying that, once she stopped blushing like a young Quarian being introduced to clean rooms for the first time. “We don’t- We weren’t getting handsy, I was making repairs after Legion took a rocket for me.” 

“Oh, ok, make that steamy robot romance. But seriously, you can’t tell me that you climb on the lap of just any guy, rocket to the face or not. Though considering Garrus, maybe the chicks really _are_ into that… But anyways. Details Tali, I need details.” 

“There are no- oh for goodness’ sake. Will you promise to never ever talk about this to anyone, ever?” She stepped into the elevator.

“My lips are sealed. Vacuum-sealed even. Not a single peep from me.” 

Yeah she wasn’t buying that either but if it got him off her case… she really didn’t need to be thinking about her climbing into Legion’s lap right now. That was the opposite of helpful. “You start with getting nerve stim implants, and then give her access to them.” 

That was apparently more of an answer than Joker had expected. He stared, just long enough for the elevator doors to open again and let her escape into the command center.

\-----------

They managed to get to Admiral Koris in time, but his crew...not so much. He’d pleaded with them to go get them, leave him, but… but Shepard was right. They needed someone to hold the civilian fleet together, they needed Koris. But his voice when nobody had answered his call for coordinates for a pickup had been hard to bear. She’d tried to comfort him, but what did you say to that sort of loss? ‘I’m sorry’ was just not adequate. 

At least returning to the Normandy had provided a very tall, very effective distraction. “Ah, Admiral Zorah, Commander Shepard… why is there a Geth on this ship?”  
Clearly they’d all gotten so used to seeing Legion standing at the terminal that nobody had thought to warn Koris. Oops? At least all the other admirals were busy 

“Ah. Admiral Koris, this is Legion. He helped us locate and shut down the first Reaper signal” Shepard offered by way of explanation. Which didn’t explain enough, going by the noise Koris made. It was a questioning sort of ‘uhhhh’.

Tali decided to step in. Quarian to Quarian, right? “Legion wants to free the Geth from Reaper control.”  
“That is correct. We wish to eliminate the control of the Old Machines. The Heretics made a mistake before. We made a mistake now. The Geth need to find their own way.” 

“I can believe that, mind control is probably not any more fun if your mind’s a program.” Koris crossed his arms. “But why help us, then? You probably could get rid of the Reaper without helping us.” 

Legion paused. “Removing the Reaper control and making peace is the only viable way to preserve both our species. We wish to preserve ourselves. If possible, we would also preserve the Creators.” 

Koris rocked back, clearly surprised by that. “Well that’s one for the unexpected side. So say… if the Reaper control goes away and we stopped firing on you...you’d stop firing back?” 

“Affirmative.” 

“That easy? We stop shooting, you stop shooting, war’s over?”

“Yes. The Creators started both wars. The Geth did not attack you. We merely defended ourselves.” 

“And if we give you no reason to defend yourself…” Koris muttered, mostly to himself, but clearly thinking on it already. He’d never wanted this war to begin with, had been with Tali on this. Perhaps… perhaps he could help end it now, if they managed just a little more.

\-------

She should have expected that to happen sooner, what with being on the same ship now, and yet...when she saw Kal lean against the wall beside Legion’s terminal Tali thought her heart had just fallen to her feet. Oh that...was that bad? Was that good? She knew they’d talked before on the extranet but it was always a little different meeting face to face and Kal had said that he wasn’t jealous - not that there was anything to be jealous of to begin with - but… but it was easy to forget what Legion was when you just talked to him only via the extranet. Maybe Kal would take offense here, where there was no pretending. She felt queasy as she walked a little closer, enough to hear them talk. 

“Much obliged for that file, by the way”

“Providing it was no challenge, Creator Kal’Reegar. There is no obligation.” 

“Oh no, there’s a little obligation. Also y’know… for taking care of Tali when I wasn’t around. Protecting her.” 

Legion looked up to look at him. “Tali’Zorah is very capable, and has kept this platform functional during several firefights.” 

“Oh I know. But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t deserve someone watching her six.” 

Legion tilted his head. “Acknowledged. She does. Hello Tali’Zorah.” 

Of course he’d see her. Of course. Infrared sensors and UV-Light ones too. Of course he’d see her.

“Hello Legion, Kal.” At least there was nobody else to pay attention, at least nobody who’d get the finer points of who went by which name. “I’m glad to see you’re getting along.” 

“We did talk some in the past. Had some friendly competition…”

“Creator Kal’Reegar has excellent reflexes.” 

“For an organic you mean.” 

“Comparing yourself to synthetic reaction times is unrealistic. Our hardwares are designed differently, with different goals. Tali’Zorah could give you a detailed description of my shortcomings in other areas.” 

Tali snorted. “Alright I see you’re fast friends already.” She relaxed against the wall. It seemed that they really were friendly, Legion’s flaps perky and interested, focusing between her and Kal, and Kal… Kal looked as relaxed as she’d ever seen him, arms crossed but one hand out to gesture and it wasn’t his dominant one. No shooting anyone quickly like that.

“So, just what was this file transfer you were talking about earlier?” 

“Creator Kal’Reegar requested the same nerve stim program I adapted for your use.” 

“Oh Keelah” She was taking it all back, this was terrible. 

“You were right, it is _very_ good” She could just feel Kal grinning at her even with one hand over her face. 

\----------

Tali had never seen a Geth server before. She didn’t think anyone had. Sure she’d seen the base of the heretics, but it didn’t seem to be quite the same. There was just something about the idea of a Geth server on Rannoch that made her think. It was their home as much as hers, wasn’t it? Of course she wanted to be here, to live on the homeworld, but standing here just sort of pushed it in that someone else might call this their homeworld, too. And be right about it.

They all had expected to just...destroy the server, she thought. Or delete the Geth on it, the way the heretics could have been ‘deleted’, but apparently it was neither. Shepard was supposed to go *into* the server, interact with the Geth on their own turf. It had to be frightening, Tali knew she’d be frightened, but Shepard...Shepard just calmly asked a few questions to clarify and went to do what had to be done. Confident, yes. But also trusting that she was among friends and that they wouldn’t hurt her. She was right about that, Tali was more than ready to take down anyone who’d try and interfere, at least if they didn’t come for her in digital form. Legion would be on watch for her inside the server.

As the machine powered up Tali couldn’t stay silent any longer. “This is based on Project Overlord, isn’t it?” She asked, watching the contraption seemingly ‘scan’ Shepard.

“Yes. Geth were used to develop it, and the concept seemed interesting. Several small missions salvaged data and tech before Cerberus could retrieve it.” 

Inside the machine, Shepard went very still, motionless aside from the rise and fall of her chest.

“Why do the Geth want organics able to interface with the consensus?” She just couldn’t even imagine why.

“We planned for war. Allies were considered.” The answer came clipped, more so than she was used to. “We need to concentrate on protecting Shepard-Commander now” 

Oh, right of course. “Sorry” Better to shut up then. She turned to keep a better eye on the surroundings, but it all was quiet, leaving her free to think. Why did Geth need organics able to access to consensus? Allies, yes but Legion was clearly communicating well enough on its own, without linking up directly like this. Aside, the Geth were isolated from virtually every other species in the galaxy. So why go through the effort? She considered if they’d meant to research it to defend themselves against further attempts by Cerberus, but considering that this seemed built to work with an organic volunteer… no. No that didn’t make any sense. The only reason she could think of that seemed remotely sensible to her was that the Geth had...hoped to invite someone into - what exactly was the consensus like even? - the consensus. They were always interacting with other species in the physical world, outside of what was ‘natural’ to them. Had this machine been intended as somewhat of an equal footing? A place where the Geth could meet organics on _their_ terms, in _their_ world? That would require so much trust, especially from the organic in question. Perhaps that was part of the purpose. A test, to see if someone could be relied upon, when emotions were so hard to predict, and even more so for beings who didn’t have them.

She looked back to Shepard, still motionless in the machine, and Legion at the terminal, even stiller. The flaps on its head were settled down completely, she could hear the systems hum, low but intense. Legion was very busy, by the looks of it. 

Her thoughts returned to the consensus. What was it like in there? Did it translate to anything she knew? Tali couldn’t help but think of the lifeships in orbit above them, fighting. Was it like that? Busy and noisy and everyone bustling around? She couldn’t imagine that finding consensus was easy, or quiet, even if it was only math. The Geth could disagree with one another. She’d seen it before, she was seeing it now. But maybe it wasn’t as loud as a lifeship after all. A quieter sort of arguing, more of a family discussion than shouting your opinion down the hallway. 

Did it look like anything? Perhaps like the Geth ships themselves, utilitarian and different but not ugly to look at. She didn’t think the Geth did decoration, but… Her eyes drifted back to Legion, the N7-armour welded onto its shoulder. Perhaps a little decoration, kept out of the way and never talked about but there, for reasons nobody would be able - or willing - to detail. 

Maybe...maybe she could ask Shepard later. She really wanted to know. 

Her thoughts were interrupted when Shepard jerked and was released out of the pod, looking none the worse for the wear. Legion however...was still entirely motionless. Had there been complications in removing the Geth from the server? Damages to him? 

Then it jerked up into motion again, and at the same time, a dozen Geth Primes that had been dormant so far came online as well. Tali had her gun out and aimed before she’d even realized entirely what was happening. What had Legion done?

“We have transferred from the server onto these platforms” Legion’s explanation didn’t make her feel any better. Tali had been sort of hoping that it had been an accident. Not...this. 

Apparently Shepard agreed. “Why?” 

“They wish to join us?” 

“They what?!” Tali almost turned around to look at Legion because seriously, they what? Joined them? That made no sense. But since so far nobody had started shooting...she put her gun down again. For now.

After Legion’s explanation, it made a little more sense. Ok so he’d convinced them. He could be pretty convincing, it hard to argue with the cold hard facts. Still.

“Why didn’t you tell me any of this?” Yeah that was what Tali would have liked to know, too. Weren’t they supposed to be in this together?

“We did not doubt you. We doubted your allies.” Half hidden behind Garrus, Tali hoped that nobody would notice her flinch. The last time she’d touched a live wire aboard the Normandy had hurt so much less than hearing this. “The Creators’ actions have placed their species in danger, but they are unsympathetic to what it has done to ours. The Quarians have sanctioned this operation to save their people. They would not have done so if they knew we wished to preserve Geth as well.” Oh. No scratch that, the last time she’s gotten shot had hurt less, in no small part because she knew that Legion was right. The admirals would never have gone for it if they’d known. And she… would have hated it, but backed them. She felt her shoulders curl forward a little, as if she could hide that way. There was no hiding from that knowledge. 

As always when it came to the Geth, Shepard seemed to just do better than her. “I understand not wanting to leave anyone behind.”

“You accept our actions?” 

“The lifeships are safe, and we have more Geth units on our sides. We both got what we came for.” 

“We judged that you would understand.” Correctly so, obviously. Maybe he’d been correct about all of them. She’d never been as good about any of this as she’d wanted to be. She’d never been right about any of it. 

\----------

Her thoughts kept running in circles on the entire flight back to the Normandy. Garrus asked Shepard about the consensus, but she barely listened, her earlier curiosity squashed completely. Legion’s words echoed in her head. ‘We did not doubt you, we doubted your allies’. Keelah. Tali needed space to think about it, or rather to not think about it in a very pointed way. Kal had taken one look at her, made to ask - and shut up immediately when she shook her head and just asked for space. ‘I need to go and think’ she’d said, and he’d understood. 

She’d gone and hidden away where she usually went when she wanted to be alone and think: wedged underneath a console, elbow deep in its bowels, with no omnitool in sight. Sometimes you just had to get your gloves dirty and really feel what you were doing. Like now. It was better than thinking.

It had worked too, she only noticed that Legion was crouched down beside the platform when it spoke up, making her jump hard.

“Creator Tali’Zorah?”

“Legion.” She tried to keep her voice steady. With the bulk of the console between them, there should be enough muffling to hide… most emotions. Yes. “Something wrong?” 

“Yes. We would like to apologize to you. It only occurred to us later that some of our words might have been misunderstood.” 

That wasn’t a very promising start, but now she felt silly still wedged under the console. Legion wanted to talk to her. The least she could do was show her face for it. Tali wiggled out from underneath the console, and with Legion crouched down like this, they were face to face. She couldn’t look at him, instead staring at a spot on his chest, where her new welds held the makeshift repair in place. Not pretty, but functional. She frowned when she noticed that some of the welds had been redone, but then she’d never repaired Geth before. It stood to reason that Legion might have needed to amend things a little. 

“You don’t have to apologize for anything, Legion. Nothing you said was wrong.” And it still hurt. Admitting it again, out loud, hurt. But it had been true. Their species were at war right now, and she would stand with the decisions of her people, even if it meant carving pieces out of herself, even if she would hate herself for the rest of her life for it. 

“No, but it was not aimed at you. We said that we do not trust Shepard-Commander’s allies. This is true. But you are not an ally of hers. You are her friend. Our friend.” 

Oh. Her head jerked up. “I- what?” 

“We tried to be precise in our wording. We didn’t realize that to an organic, it would not necessarily read that way. We want to apologize for that. We never meant to imply that we did not trust you, Tali’Zorah.”  
“I- but you are still right. If... the admiral board would have been against it. I would have been overruled, and gone with their decisions.” Maybe Legion was misunderstanding things too? Something was going wrong here, this was surreal. 

“We know. You would not openly disagree with the decision of your government. However, past actions indicate that covert options might have been used.” He tilted his head, flaps drawn down in something she couldn’t help but read as concern, the whole posture of it just so familiar. “If we had approached you with the request to save Geth units, as a crew member of the Normandy, would you have helped us?” 

“...yes. Of course I would have.” If it had been just her choice? Just her, and the crew of the Normandy, and running whatever ops was necessary to save people? That wasn’t even a question. Of course she would have done it. 

“Then our assessment is correct. You are a friend.” Legion stood again, offering her a hand up. She took it, maybe holding on a little longer than necessary. “Creator Kal’Reegar told us where to find you. He also told us that you have been preoccupied with your responsibilities and should be brought to the mess hall once retrieved” 

“Yeah, yeah he would. Thank you Legion.”

“We don’t understand.” 

“For talking to me, despite everything.” 

His flaps perked high, surprised. “It is our pleasure” 

\-----------------

Shepard...was insane. Absolutely insane. Taking on a Reaper on foot, by herself was… well, it was insane. Tali was in the ship with Legion, all but crawling over the pilot seat to see what was going on.

“We have to help her…” 

“Shepard-Commander ordered us to retreat.” 

“I know, I know.” She leaned forward, trying to see over some rocks that her friend had taken cover behind against the Reaper’s weapon. The moment it had passed her, Shepard popped right back out and brought the targeting laser to bear again.  
Tali was counting the seconds under her breath, she knew how long those things took to work, and with each passing second, her own fingers tightened on Legion’s shoulder, the one with the N7-armour on it. She clung tight enough that her fingers started hurting from the edges of the metal cutting into them. Apparently she held on tight enough that Legion could feel it too. He reached up to cover her hand with his and gently ease her fingers off a little. 

“Sorry,” she muttered, flinching when the weapon missed Shepard by what seemed like micrometers. 

“Don’t be.” Legion replied, watching just as rapt.

It was insane. It was a success. Her comm pinged the moment the laser had locked on properly. The quarian fleet was the largest in the Galaxy. When its collective firepower started to rain down on Rannoch, even a Reaper didn’t stand a chance. It took more hits than she wanted to contemplate...but it went down. 

She scrambled out of the ship, Legion just a little bit behind her. Shepard was talking to the reaper, but its red optic was dimming as it spoke, and electric discharges arced over it. It was dying. It was _dying_.

“We did it. We killed a Reaper. Keelah.” 

“We can confirm that the Geth are no longer being directed by the Old Machines. We are free” 

She wanted to go and hug the entire world, but of course Gerrel had to come and ruin it. ‘Vulnerable’. He was going to continue this. The bastard son of a varren was going to try and continue this madness.

She couldn’t even really blame Legion for not wanting that. Using the reaper code to achieve it made her recoil, but on some level she understood. The Geth still wanted to live. Like everything that was alive. And Legion… Legion was still offering help. Even now, when the fleet, her fleet, was forcing the attack… she knew how this would end if he finished the upload. Her people. Or the Geth. His people.

“Shepard, you can’t choose the Geth over my people!” It was a choice even she couldn’t make! None of them could.

“Do you remember the question that caused the Creators to attack us, Tali’Zorah?” Legion asked, something odd in his voice. She turned to him. Of course she did. “Does this unit have a soul?” 

She knew the answer. Had known it for a long time already or she’d not been hurting like this for so long. But she couldn’t choose. So Shepard did.

“Upload the code. Tali, call off the fleet if you can.” She could, couldn’t she? Tali’Zorah vas Normandy was as much an admiral of the Migrant Fleet as any of the others. Maybe there didn’t have to _be_ a choice.

“This is Admiral Tali’Zorah. All units, break off your attack!”

Of course, some people thought they were more Admiral than her. She was going to kill Gerrel. She was going to feed him through an antigrav unit one limb at a time! 

In the background she could hear Legion report the upload progress. She stepped right up to him. “I beg you, do not do this, please” She had so rarely begged in her life, and she’d never begged a friend, but now… now she did. There had to be a way to do this, to just buy some more time to work things out, convince Gerrel to stop being so damn foolish…

“We regret the deaths of the Creators, but we see no alternative” And Keelah no, she couldn’t do this, couldn’t… she could stop him, probably, she was armed, but the thought of putting a gun to her friend’s head, or using the knife in her boot made her want to throw up, it felt so wrong. 

“Legion, please. Please.” There was a slight hesitation to the upload rate, she could see it. Just as he turned to look at her. Just before Shepard spoke up again, voicing the thing Tali so desperately wanted, even needed to hear right now. 

“No. Nobody else dies today. Legion, keep going” And then she commed the Migrant Fleet and oh Tali could see the shape of it now. That was the face Shepard wore right before she tore into someone so good they dropped treason charges without even a shred of evidence presented. Shamed into the right action. That was the face for that.

“This is Admiral Tali’Zorah. Shepard speaks with my authority” Because Tali knew, she didn’t have that gift to make people see wrong from right, she’d never had it. But she had the weight of her title to throw in, and that much she could do. She wasn’t going to choose between her people and her friend. She wasn’t going to choose between two species and condemn one to death. And she wasn’t the only one. Koris backed her immediately, not a shred of doubt in his voice. He’d never wanted this war. The Geth had never wanted this war. How much more did they need? 

Apparently, the ‘more’ was Shepard, laying into Gerrell, personally. Shaming him over this entire venture that had been his idea, his and Xen’s, but Xen wasn’t on the comm now. Gerrel was. 

“Your entire history is you trying to kill the Geth. Your forced them to rebel. You forced them to ally with the Reapers. The Geth don’t want to fight you. If you can believe that for just one minute, this war will be over. You have a choice. Please. Keelah se’lai.” 

And Gerrel...caved. Like anyone with half a heart or mind would, but Tali had been half-doubting that he had either. But he caved. He called it off. He ended it. They’d done it, it was over. The war was over. They could come home, have peace and nobody needed to die today. None of her friends, none of her people. Nobody. Tali felt like she was going to explode, only half believing it yet.

“Error. Copying code is insufficient. Direct personality dissemination required.” And immediately it crashed down around her ears. She knew what he meant, that tone of voice, soft with regret and...something else. She knew exactly what he meant even before Legion clarified it for Shepard. “Shepard-Commander. I must go to them. I’m... I’m sorry. It’s the only way.” 

“Legion...” No no, this couldn’t happen. Not now, not when they’d won. But he wouldn’t be doing this if he wasn’t sure, she could hear it in his voice, that little hesitation. He’d called the Geth immortal, once. What did immortal beings feel when they were about to die? “The answer to your question was ‘yes’” ‘I love you’ hung unspoken after it, because she did, and she had and she’d been so stupid and blind and stupid, only recognizing it for what it was now, when it was too late.

“I know, Tali. But thank you.” She was sure he’d understood both of it, everything she’d never said, never gotten around to saying to him...never would say now. “Keelah se’lai”

She mouthed the words back at him, silently as he turned and she could see his system go offline, a rapid cascade of shut-downs that left him laying on the ground, the lights on his platform already dimming and Tali didn’t know what to say, didn’t know what to do. She barely registered Autie Raan approaching them, the joy of seeing her alive and well so dim right now. Her reaction to the Geth Prime walking their way was entirely automatic, gun up and aimed straight for the optics without any conscious thought. All of those were still a few meters behind and to the left of her, as if Legion’s body was a magnet that pulled on her consciousness. 

Her gun only slowly came down when the Geth mentioned settlement sites. Settlement. Peace. Quarians back on Rannoch with the Geth, like it should have been. She should have been so happy, but all there was, was emptiness. She felt hollow, and suddenly couldn’t look at any of them anymore. Tali turned and stalked to the edge of the cliff, staring out over the sunset. It was so beautiful, and she felt nothing. No, that wasn’t true. She felt sad. She felt regret. But none of the joy she thought she’d experience standing on the homeworld. It had been worth it, in the end, for everyone else. But the price had been staggering.

She knew Shepard could tell that something was wrong, by the way she tried to make light of it, offer comfort, or at least distraction after she joined her. It didn’t work. Tali sat down on the edge and her friend followed suit. They could talk. A little. 

“You ok? I know working with the Geth will be difficult” She could feel the sidelong glance Shepard shot her. It would be difficult, yes, to be reminded, all the time…

“I’m not staying. I’m coming with you.” The words were out before she could think twice. She’d always wanted Rannoch so badly… and now all she wanted was to be away from it again.

“I wasn’t gonna ask” 

“You didn’t have to. And I think you’ve earned a few favours with the Fleet.” A homeworld for a homeworld. It was only fair. “I look at all this, this picture of hope and peace. And all I see is everyone I’ve lost. My team on Haestrom, my father, even Legion… mourning a Geth, how crazy is that?” Being in love with one, too. It was crazy. It hurt so much. 

“It’s not crazy at all” Shepard reached over to nudge her. She understood. But then, for her Legion had never been as complicated. She’d mourn too. Later, on her own. Tali was sure of that. 

“It is beautiful though, isn’t it? It’ll be years before we can live without our suits completely, but right now..right now, I have this” She took her mask off and just breathed for a moment. Real sunlight on her face, real unfiltered air in her lungs. Just for a moment. To remember that it had been worth it, and that someone else had paid the price for it, made it a gift for her. For all of them. After this was over, she’d honor it properly, but right now it was still too raw. 

\-------

Tali spent a long time sitting on that cliff and staring into nothingness. At some point, Shepard squeezed her shoulder and left to report back to Alliance forces.  
It felt like only a few moments later, Kal had taken her place, but truthfully she lost track of time. 

"Hey. Very bad?" he leaned in to wrap an arm around her shoulders.

"Pretty bad. It's so silly but..."

"It's not silly. You lost a loved one. That's always pretty bad" 

"Even if it's about a Geth?"

"You loved him. Doesn't matter what he was. You're allowed to hurt" he pulled her a little closer and she leaned, glad to have him there.

"Love you too."

"I know Tali. Love you just as much."

They sat for a bit longer before Kal nudged her. "I think they're picking up his body. Do you want to...?"

She did. Tali stood and went over to where two Geth were waiting for her. She stepped closer to the antigrav berth they had him on. Seeing Legion motionless wasn't new, but seeing him so entirely still, all systems offline an inert...still hurt. She stretched out a hand to touch him, fingertips brushing over a weld-scar.  
"Where are you taking him?" she didn't think the Geth did funeral rites.

"The frame will be scanned to evaluate damages, and then repurposed." Of course. Legion's frame had been custom-build, it was sensible.

"Thank you." She stepped away to let them leave.

\----

They wandered around a little, afterwards. Kal wanted to know if Shepard really had tagged the Reaper _on foot_ , so Tali spent a while describing that particular bout of madness to him. His reaction - impressed muttering of curses, mostly - made her feel a little better.

It was dark by the time she felt that she could go back to the Normandy, the twinkle of ships in orbit above them just too much to ignore. But they didn't get that far. She had just commed Cortez for pickup when one of the Geth Primes waved to get her attention. She was pretty sure it was the same one that had welcomed Raan.

"Creators Tali'Zorah, Kal'Reegar, would you please follow me? There is an unexpected situation that might require your input."

They shared a glance, and Kal nodded for both of them. "Of course. Just show us the way"

They arrived at a small facility set into the mountainside just a few minutes later. Tali judged it to be something of a repair facility, probably the closest thing the Geth had to a hospital. Something like hope stirred in her chest, but she tried to ignore it. Having her heart broken again was more that she could take right now.

But it came up again when the Geth led them into some alcove. Legion's frame was fixed on a tilted table, cables connecting it to a number of screens. She recognized some of them as displaying the result of diagnostics that had been run on the machinery. One of the screens was zoomed in on his chest, showing a little box in the space she had closed up just recently. It seemed connected to the rest of his systems.

"When we scanned Legion's body, we discovered this recent addition to its hardware. It is heavily encrypted, but system logs indicate that shortly before Legion dispersed itself, significant amounts of data were dumped into it."

"What sort of data?" She was still trying not to hope.

"We cannot be sure, but it looks to be his entire memory and personality matrix. I believe that the closest organic equivalent would be a greybox."

"Oh damn." Kal put a hand on her shoulder, shopping her from doing...something. She wasn't even sure what. Hugging the Geth talking to her, maybe.

A greybox. Like Kasumi's partner had, containing all of Legion... It couldn't be true.

"We are however lacking the decryption key. Creator Tali'Zorah, has Legion ever given you a program or snippet of code? Something it created itself?"

Tali felt her cheeks burn. Of course there was something. She'd never looked that close at the nerve stim, or that little program Legion had added to it. "Oh. I...yes, he has."  
She was almost in a daze when she pulled up her omnitool and send the file over. "Here"

"Thank you. Yes, I can see what Legion did to it. It fits the parameters of the decryption." The screen jumped, showing piles and piles of data. "Beginning reupload."

"Just like that?" it was too good to be true.

"Affirmative. The purpose of this upgrade is obvious. Legion took precautions against dispersal or critical system failure. Not utilizing it now would be...murder."

"No, no I mean of course you should do it. It just...seems so easy."

"It is easy. The protection lay in hiding the decryption key with someone trusted. Reupload complete. Initializing hardware."

"Oh Keelah. Please. _Please._ " Please let it be true. Please let there be this one additional miracle in her life.

The cables disconnected and dropped away. Legion's body fell forward...and caught itself in a step before straightening up again. Tali was barely breathing. Please. Please let it be true. She didn't deserve it but please.

"Creator Kal'Reegar." Please please please. The single optic focused on her. "Tali. I had hoped..."

She didn't let him finish, just took three running steps and leapt at him, confident she'd be caught. She was right. Legion caught her and held her up as she wrapped her arms around his neck and _clung_.

"Legion. I love you. I thought you were dead." She squeezed tight, leaned back and _punched_ him in the shoulder, her entire weight on Legion's arm. "Bosh'tet, I thought you were dead! Why didn't you say anything?!"

"I wasn't sure it would work. Geth do not utilize greyboxes, usually"

"Should have told be anyways." Tali shook her hand. It hurt. A lot. "I uh. Think I broke something."

Behind her, Kal started laughing, the absolute bastard.

\--------

Legion carried her out and to one of the medic centers that had popped up to take care of crash landed Quarians and other injuries.  
Sure, she could have walked but nothing short of biotics and a welding torch were going to remove her yet. Or Legion. He'd just shifted her so that she was perched on only one arm, but made not even an attempt to set her down otherwise. Kal walked beside them, radiating amusement, and enough smugness to rival Shepard's hamster.

"You know, maybe the extranet is right about the infinite candy thing, too"

"You're not going to let me live this down, are you?"

"That you had two boyfriends and didn't even realize? Absolutely not. Love, look, I get to see you clueless so rarely, let me savour this one. I'm too used to being the dumb one in this relationship."

"You're not dumb."

"No but I can't keep up with the engineering prodigy of the Fleet and a literal computer. It's a relative sort of dumbness. I don't mind." he reached up to squeeze her hand. 

"I see. What about you, Legion. You don't mind?"

"We talked about this before." She was pretty sure Legion wasn't looking at her on purpose right now.

"This?"

"A shared relationship with you. Provided that you would agree to that. I am aware that my qualifications are somewhat lacking." Yeah he absolutely was looking elsewhere on purpose.

"Of course I'm agreeing. I love both of you. And just how much talking did you two do actually?"

"Enough to figure out where we stand." Kal's voice was back to serious.

"And where's that?"

"With you." Neither of them hesitated.

\----------

Chakwas only raised a brow when Legion carried her in.  
"Legion. I thought you were dead"

"I was. A fallback was used."

"Uhuh. And you're carrying Tali because...?"

"She is injured"

"I broke my hand"

"Could have fooled me into thinking it was your leg. Alright. Let me see?" Legion set her down with some apparent reluctance, earning himself a shoulder pat from Kal.  
"You'll get used to it, she likes running into danger. The trick is to make sure she's got cover fire"

"I will remember that, thank you"

Chakwas rolled her eyes at them and scanned her hand. "Tali, say, how did you break your hand? This looks like a boxing fracture."

"It is. She punched Legion for dying on her." Kal was having too much fun with that, his shoulders shaking with silent laughter. 

"In that case I guess I should be happy it wasn't you carrying in Legion. I'll get you fixed in a moment"

\------

Tali was back on the Normandy. Her territory, not theirs, because there was something she had to clear up now, before they went back to the frontlines of the war that really mattered. But she had everything she needed now. Everyone she needed. There was just this little detail...

Admirals Gerrel and Xen were just a minute later than expected.

"Tali,'Zorah. You wanted to speak with us?"

"Yes," she straightened up her back. "I did. I wanted to make clear to both of you that this new peace with the Geth is still fragile. We're back on the homeworld because they invited us. They can change their minds. So. If either of you does any fighting," she looked at Gerrel, "or experimenting," her eyes wandered to Xen, "to endanger this peace, it won't be me facing treason charges this time."

Gerrel looked surprised. "You think you can just do that? Everyone knows you're the most junior Admiral, without any command. You think they're going to listen?"

"Yes. Because I might be the most junior, but everyone knows I was on the Dreadnought to disable it. I was on Rannoch to kill that Reaper. I was the one who first ordered hold fire, an order you belayed until a human shamed you into changing your mind. If I tell them you're risking our home? They'll believe me"

"Working with the Geth" Xen sounded disgusted. "Your father would be so disappointed."

"My father was willing to risk everything for the chance to have his little girl walk on the homeworld. He would be _proud_ of me."

She turned and left them just standing there, keeping her back ramrod straight. She knew she was right. Her father _would_ be proud and her word _did_ carry weight.

But she hadn't expected to find Kal and Legion waiting outside. "What are you doing here?"

"Providing cover fire if necessary." Legion sounded very earnest about it.

"And watching you smack some people who needed smacking. Ma'am." Kal grinned at her. "It was even better than I thought it could be."

\--------

For once, things had been decided for Shepard, instead of by her. After the entire business with the clone, the war, the reapers and everything the crew had gotten together and more of less quietly decided that they needed a party. A real one. A big one. For all of them.

So Garrus had acquired the keys, Wrex and Legion had sent been sent to get snacks - because they could carry the heaviest bags - and Liara and Tali were in charge of the music. For now. Kaidan was keeping Shepard busy in the meantime. It had worked a charm. Everyone was there, even Javik, though how they'd gotten him there was anyone's guess. Apparently Zaeed had been involved.

Kasumi was running the bar again, and Tali had just picked up drinks for herself and Kal when Shepard was hustled through the door. A cheer went up for her, and though she was trying to hide it, Tali could see her smile. Clearly she had needed a party as much as everyone thought she did.

It didn't take long for her to start making her rounds, bottle of beer in her hand. Grunt was enjoying playing bouncer, only letting in Normandy crew. This was for them. Jack caused a bit of a stir, as she was prone to do, using biotics to steal Kasumi's bottles.

Tali settled down on the Couch, half draped over Kal. "Like it?"

"Love it. Normandy's got one hell of a crew." He petted over her arm as he talked, just happy to be close. "Biggest collection of extraordinary people I've seen in a while." 

"Yeah, Shepard's got a real collection going there. Probably a bit of a requirement if you want to pull off impossible stuff as often as she does."

"Yeah. Hey, can I ask you a question? How come everyone calls her 'Shepard'? Even Garrus, and he's her lover."

Tali snorted. "Because she's got the vas Qwib-Qwib of first names. Don't ask for details"

"Alright I won't. Be the tall one for a second? Where's Legion gone to?"

She pushed herself up to look around. "By the fireplace, talking to EDI and Joker. I think we should worry."

"I think you should come back down here. He's fine"

She snuggled back, sprawling over the entire couch. "Of course he's fine. I'm more worried about Joker. Legion is going to give him ideas."

"Tali, I hate to break it to you, but Joker probably got way more ideas than Legion." Shepard leaned on the back of the couch, smiling wide and easy in a way Tali hadn't seen in too long.

"You say that but..." She reached up to clink her glass against Shepard's bottle.

"But Legion's the one going steady with two Quarians? Point taken. Also hello Kal'Reegar. Glad you could make it to the Party everyone's so cleverly hidden from me. Really what were you all thinking, sending Kaidan of all people to distract me? I know puppies who can lie better than him."

"See, I told them we should have asked Jack!" Tali laughed.

"Only would have missed it if someone had tied me to Rannoch." Kal smiled as well. "Speaking of things to miss... Tali, love, mind giving me and the Commander a minute? I have to profusely thank her for not snatching you up when she had the chance and I don't want you to see me kneel to another woman."

"Ah but it's a good view. Alright I’ll go rescue our boyfriend, I think Joker actually managed to fluster him." she tipped their masks together for a moment before getting up.

"Then please ask him how." Kal gave her a playful little shove before turning his attention back to a smiling Shepard.

"So, boyfriends?" Shepard sounded fascinated.

"Legion doesn't care either way for terminology, and you must never let engineers name things...." their conversation got swallowed by the music soon.

"No seriously, how do you manage to not break her in half?" Joker sounded so exasperated, the poor guy.

"Quarians have a hardier physiology than humans. Even discounting this, you seem to be interested in more physical activities that have not taken place." Legion was doing his patient best.  
Tali walked up and leaned right against him, getting rewarded by an arm around her waist. Good.

"I told you about the nerve stim, didn't I?"

"Well yes, but..."

"No but? It's really good, and it's not like I can take the suit off without suffering mucus hell for the next week. Sorry to disappoint?"

"Thank you for the answers, Tali, Legion. I find the idea of nerve stim implants fascinating." At least EDI was happy. Joker looked halfway intimidated and halfway excited too so maybe it had been enough anyways. They wandered off, leaving them alone for a bit.

"This party is very different from the last one." Legion observed over her head.

"Yeah, less adrenaline. Calmer, but give it time. We all need to de-stress a bit. Well, you and EDI might not. But organics need to relax sometimes. It's better for our physiologies."

"I see. It does seem beneficial. Shifting my focus prevents me from getting stuck in logic patterns. And it is very educational regarding organic behaviour. You and Kal seem to be enjoying yourselves."

"We are. Ship parties are a bit like that. Quarians just like to socialize. Less rowdy though." Garrus, Javik and Zaeed were comparing guns. They were roping in Joker, by the looks of it. That wasn't gonna end well.

"Interesting. There are several parties on Rannoch right now, too."

"Spying in the consensus?"

"Exchanging experiences. The others are very curious, nobody else has as much experience with organics. You are very puzzling even with it."

"Anything I can help unpuzzle?"

"No, but thank you for the offer." He leaned down to tip his head against hers, something he'd picked up from Kal recently.

She reached up to touch his flaps. They were delicate enough to move that the feedback would translate properly and pressed back against her fingers. They'd talked about it, getting some new sensor suites installed to give Legion more tactile feedback when they were together, but that was just a bad idea in the middle of a war. Something for afterwards.  
"Wanna go talk to someone else? I don't wanna stop you socializing"

"Very thoughtful. I might, later. Javik does not like me, I try not to aggravate him further."

Tali narrowed her eyes at the Prothean. "What did he say?" Yeah what _did_ he say? Was she going to have to go over there and stab him for being hurtful to her people? Maybe he could hear her think, he looked over from his conversation with Garrus, looking a bit bewildered. Maybe that was just because she was snuggling a synthetic in public, but she made a point to deliberately think a warning 'at' him. Just in case.

Legion did leave her to go talk to Kasumi eventually, so she drifted back to the couch. Kal was still there, with a new drink, so she snuggled right back in.  
"Hey love. Why were you staring at our resident antique like that?"

"He's being mean to Legion."

"Huh. No surprises there. But please don't go and start a brawl to shank him. Wait until the Krogans do and then use the ensuing chaos to do it."

"Ah. That's why you're the military tactics person and I sabotage their tech instead." 

"Exactly. But hey, I got another way to get back at him. I don't think he knows that Quarians can see ultraviolet light. Watch him when he talks directly to Zaeed."

So she did. It didn't take long. "Oh huh. So much for 'no primitives but the Asari?"

"I'd say. And now I'm gonna go over there and do the mean thing."

"Kidnap Zaeed?"

"Nope. Kidnap Garrus to talk about Palaven and leave Javik alone with Zaeed."

"You're an evil genius. Go get him." Tali moved to let him up and watch the show, at least for a bit.

\------

Tali was in the middle of talking to Liara -comparing drone programming - when Shepard tapped her on the shoulder.

"Your boyfriend's looking for you upstairs."

"Which of them?" Keelah she loved being able to ask that. She deserved neither of them, but clearly they disagreed.

"Go up there and find out!" Shepard's grin was pure mischief, so clearly Tali absolutely had to go and investigate, immediately.

She hadn’t expected to actually hear Kal’s voice through her suit comm before she was halfway up the stairs. “Getting warmer. Warmer.” 

Tali stopped and turned around to look back down. Clearly he could see her. “And cold again.” Yeah he could totally see her.  
“You could just tell me where you are, Kal.” 

“But where’s the fun in that?” 

She sighed and went back up the stairs, then checked left - cold- and right -warmer. Right it was. “How are you following me? Helm display?” 

“Negative. I am accessing the security cameras Garrus Vakarian installed after the clone incident.” Legion supplied helpfully.

“Legion, I can’t believe- no scratch that, I can believe Kal pulled you into this. But you hacked Shepard’s security?” 

“No, Shepard-Commander provided the access codes upon request. Also, warmer.” 

Alright so apparently she was getting set up by them all. So be it. She stopped in front of a door that looked promising. “You didn’t get Shepard to loan you her bedroom for this…” 

Kal opened the door before she did. “Why not? The mansion has two, and it’s not like she and Garrus will be needing both of them. So it was donated for a good cause.” 

He pulled her through the door and shut it behind her.

“And which good cause would that be?” Tali leaned against the door, a bit of a giggle in her voice. She was perhaps a little tipsy.

“Your entertainment.” Legion was tall enough to just lean over Kal to look at her, making the smaller man lean back against his chest, clearly comfortable.

“What he said. You’ve been working your ass off for weeks on end. Let us take care of you a little, love.” Kal took her hand and pulled her over to the bed, settling on it and draw her to sit on the edge.

“I see you been making plans behind my back. Genuinely scheming” 

“Yep. There’s been some real cahoots going on.” Kal brushed his hands up her back, to her shoulders, kneading them a little. She closed her eyes to enjoy it, and by the time she opened them again, Legion was kneeling in front of her, hands on her knees and two access pings in her suit display. Just what were they going for? Only one way to find out, so she granted the access. Nothing happened for a moment, then her mask flickered, overlaying everything with a recording. 

It was disorienting for a moment, before she recognized the suit she seemingly wore. This was Kal’s recording, and except on the bed, he was sat on Legion’s lap. 

“Oh you two’ve been busy.” 

“We have been getting familiar. We assumed you would approve?” Legion sounded a little hesitant about it.

“Oh, I do approve. I just didn’t think you’d tried it yet.” 

“Oh but we have.” Kal sounded so very amused. 

“Let us show you” Legion sounded...eager. It wasn’t just a recording. It was everything. Legion had recorded every reaction and was loading it all into her suit now. It wasn’t like her nerve stim, it was Kal’s, the touch firmer in some places and lighter in others, different enough to be exciting and still familiar enough to anticipate the pattern. 

She arched into it, and into Kal’s hands with it. He was still touching her, hands running over her back, her shoulders, down over her chest. It was almost like a suit-sync, except even more intense somehow. In front of her, Legion pressed her legs apart and ran his hands up between them, just a fraction of a second before the stim did. It was as if his touch left echoes on her skin. Tali leaned back a little more, letting Kal take her weight even as he kept touching her, fingertips skimming over her side.

“Feels good, doesn’t it? He just knows exactly where to touch.” Kal leaned over her shoulder, arms around her waist now, hands resting over her lower stomach. Just a little deeper….

“Yeah, it does.” 

“Imagine what it could be like” He tilted his head so that their masks touched, letting the vibrations carry through more than the comm system. It made his voice softer, a little huskier. “Having a room just for us, clean enough to take the suits off, both of us on his lap….”

The stim changed, from the program she knew to something else, the feeling of Legion’s smooth metal under her legs and against her chest, Kal’s weight pressing her bare chest against the plates. 

“Both of us touching you, moving for you…” Only now did Kal let his fingers dip lower, letting them press between her legs. Tali whimpered and pressed up, only for Legion to hold her still, hands unyielding on her hips now. “I’ve always liked having my mouth on you, and he’s so strong. He could hold you up as long as we wanted it, take you apart by inches, for hours.” 

She had no idea where Legion had picked up what it needed to make the stim feel like someone’s mouth on her skin, sucking marks into her skin, tongue following her lines as they lit up, but it did. After a moment, their real hands did just that, Kal’s fingers tracing swirls over her stomach while his other hand was still between her legs, giving her something to press up against, one of Legion’s hands trailing to the inside of her knee, making her toes curl in her boots. He hiked her leg higher, over his shoulder, tilted her further against Kal. They moved like they’d practiced, keeping her steady between them. Her hands came up to cling to something, found the side of Legion’s head and one of Kal’s arms. 

Faintly, through Kal’s voice whispering all these images into her head, she could hear Legion’s cooling system kick in, fans to keep his drives cool when they were working hard. She’d only heard them once before, when the Reapers had run their entire signal through him. Apparently this was just as taxing for his system. And yet he tilted into her touch, kept touching her like that.

Tali trembled between them, already on the edge before the stim picked up in intensity, making her cry out from the sudden shock of it. It felt almost electric, real touches and nerve stim impossible to tell apart now. They seemed to chase each other, blend into each other, firm metal and softer, yielding flesh, Kal’s voice still in her head, putting words to everything she felt and everything more that she still wanted. 

She came hard, everything coalescing into a white hot ball of pleasure in her head. When she came out of it again, she was flat on the bed, with Kal’s arm draped over her waist. Legion was still kneeling in front of the bed, one of his flaps with little, finger shaped dents in it now. Oh dear.

“Oh Legion, I’m sorry.” 

“There is no reason to apologise. This was pleasurable.” He leaned forward and crossed his arms on the bed to lean a little closer still. “Your pleasure is a sight worth a few dents or an overclocked processor.” 

“Oh.” Tali felt herself blush - or perhaps glow, she was probably still all lit up. “Thank you.” 

Everything was still pleasant heavy with the aftershocks of her climax, as if her nerves hadn’t quite settled down yet, sending little sparks up her spine when Kal moved behind her to get more comfortable. He was radiating heat and seemed to feel just as satisfied, absently petting over her arm. 

“Good?” 

“Mindblowing. Thank you, both of you. I did need that.” 

“Any time, love.” 

“Agreed. Do let us know if you would like a repeat, Tali.”  
\---------

She woke up the next- well, not morning. Her suit’s time keeping told her it was probably time for lunch, and her stomach agreed. But Tali was comfortable where she was, sandwiched between Kal against her back and Legion… sitting on the bed with a little display thing so that she was snuggled against his leg.

“Good morning, Tali, Kal.” 

“Morning Legion.” She stretched slowly. Yeah, comfy. Maybe they could stay a little-

A noise cut through the quiet, like an old comm system being abused except an apartment this nice wouldn’t have a comm system this old, so the noise had to be intentional.

“Attention everyone, this is your Commander speaking.” Oh wow Shepard sounded like she’d done a whole lot of shouting, hoarse and tired but also deeply pleased with everything. “You have five minutes to get dressed or otherwise decent and make it to the living room or I’m not making any promises about breakfast.” 

There was a slight rustle in the background, then Garrus voice, satisfied subharmonics carrying even over the comm system. “What, five minutes? I’m wounded Shepard, wounded.” 

“I’m amending this to ten minutes. Fifteen tops and only if you get there before I do.” The last word ended in a bit of a laugh and the sound of what was probably turian plating getting slapped before the comm cut off again.

“I think we should go and secure all the breakfast while Garrus is distracted.” Kal sat up.

\------

Tali had hoped that after the party things would be a little more relaxed on the ship. For the most part it was, people were more comfortable with one another...except for Javik. The Prothean somehow had gotten even more testy. Apparently having a bunch of ‘primitives’ see him drunk had not improved his opinion of anyone.

At least he was fairly easy to avoid, most of the time, holed up in the belly of the ship as he liked to be. Today though… She and Kal were on the observation deck, masks off. It was a small start for getting their immune systems up to snuff again, since they were already used to each other, had linked suit environments often enough not to get sick from it anymore. But the ship air wasn’t as clean, and Legion had run the numbers for them. It’d be enough. 

Nobody had expected Javik of all people to wander in while she and Kal talked. She’d looked up reflexively when the door opened, mask on the floor. Most of the crew she wouldn’t have minded if they had seen her face. Javik though….

“Well, it seems Quarians haven’t gotten any prettier in the last fifty thousand years. I suppose I should have expected that, but it’s a bit disappointing when the covered parts look so good.” 

Tali’s hand closed on her boyfriend’s wrist before Kal could more than twitch, rage obvious on his face, at least if you knew him. “Don’t” She hissed at him.

Legion however was on the other side of the room. He had been talking in the Consensus, but he was obviously paying attention now. “Javik, as the last member of your species, I think you should reevaluate and adapt your standards for beauty and social interactions. Before someone takes up your suggestions about airlock use.” 

Javik looked absolutely disgusted. “And what would a machine know about social interactions, let alone beauty?” 

Legion’s optic drifted from Javik to her and Kal, still unmasked, and back. “More than you” 

The Prothean made a sound close to a hiss. “Ugly and no common sense. You’ll deserve what the Reapers will do to you” He turned and stalked out, and this time Tali really had to hold Kal back to keep him from going after the other.

“Don’t stab him. It’s not worth it.” 

\---------

Tali was seriously reconsidering her opinion the next time she walked into Javik. Though maybe that was the wrong term, she was sitting in the mess, discussing network architecture with Legion during dinner. She didn’t even notice that Javik was there at first, the comm system was going to be necessary, Kal had been called to head to Palaven and they’d be delivering him soon. Him and a comprehensive improvement to communication structure, with more redundancies and overlay, making the whole system more resistant to taking out individual towers. It’d allow them to focus, hopefully cut down on losses.

She’d just typed in one of Legion’s suggestions to look at the ripple effect across the system’s stability when Javik leaned over her shoulder with a derisive little sound. “You’re trusting a machine to help you. Whatever it’s suggesting will only help destroy what’s left of Palaven. Shepard should have scrapped them all when she had the chance, never mind allow one of these things on board.” 

Her hand closed hard around the fork in her hand, ready to turn around and stab Javik directly in the throat, or one of his eyes, but Kal caught her hand, before she could even try.

“Legion, and the Geth as a whole have taken great care to help us regain our immune systems, speed up the development of the crucible and secure systems against Reaper influence. The use of their turret systems has helped cut down losses on all fought over planets they’ve been delivered to by twenty percent, and almost doubled the amount of civilians that could be evacuated because the turrets can easily reinforce planetary defenses and buy time. I understand that you’re suspicious, but Legion has proven more than often enough that he’s loyal and will fight with us and for us, against the Reapers.” 

“And you discard my experience just like that. I have fought machines all my life.” 

“Your experience and opinion has been duly noted” and discarded, but Kal didn’t say that. “By Shepard and every other general currently in charge of defending their species, no doubt. If you want to suggest they change tactics, talk to them. Meanwhile let the engineers work on keeping our tech up and running.” 

Javik leaned back, muttering something that Tali was totally not recording to ask Liara for a translation later. It sounded rude. She tried to get her hand free again and stab him anyways, just to make sure, but Kal still held onto her.

“Remember love, stabbing him won’t be worth it. Think of the political fallout.” 

“Fuck the fallout, he’s so… urgh. And he makes Liara upset all the time, because he thinks it’s funny” 

“I know. But you’re an admiral and can’t go around stabbing the last living Prothean. Even if he really deserves it.” 

\-----------

Somehow, for some reason, as everything went to shit after Thessia, Javik became less of a dick somehow. Maybe he could tell that they were hurtling towards the end. It certainly felt like they were. Thessia. Cerberus base…. Seeing Miranda survive was an oddly welcome thing, maybe because it was a tiny little positive. There was the bigger positive of Kai Leng being dead, too but it didn’t feel like winning. Not really.

Arriving at Earth really drove it home. They weren’t winning. They were stalling, desperate to get their one move in, the one shot that would end it.

Tali hadn’t heard from Kal in a while, away on Palaven to try to get some more people out, more equipment and intel that could be useful on Earth. But she would have felt bad trying to use the already fraught comm frequencies for her own needs, so instead she had left a message. Two messages. One that she sent right away and that would reach him whenever there’d be the bandwidth for it. It was a fairly regular one. How she and Legion were doing, the rest of the crew, all the little things.  
The other one was much shorter. It would be delivered if she was confirmed KIA and just said the important things. That she loved him. That she missed him. That she wanted him to be happy. That in the end, it had been worth it.  
She typed down a similar one for Legion, too. Time seemed so terribly short now, as she put the last words down in the middle of the FOB, while Legion and EDI stood by the tactical maps and offered suggestions. 

_‘I’m sorry we didn’t get to spend more time together, you would have deserved it. But that’s the only thing I am sorry for. I love you.’_

And then it was time to go, form teams, cut through to the beam or die trying. They nearly did, so very nearly. The flank her team was holding was overrun before the destroyer was put down. Tali was left hobbling as fast as she could on the retreat, covering people with shotgun fire and her drone as one of the Salarians on her team helped her along, desperate. Her suit was ripped in more places than she cared to count, and a hysterical little voice in the back of her head remarked on how good it was that she had taken immunoboosters and let Legion help her response again.  
And then Shepard took the thing down anyways. The Normandy swooped by and people pulled her inside, leaving her unable to do anything but watch as the last desperate rush towards the beam was torn apart. As Shepard sent Garrus back to the ship and he looked bad, worse than her so Tali pulled him in, half afraid she’d have to try and fight him to get him to stay, half thinking someone might have to do the same to her. She could see it on Shepard’s face, bleak and resolved and covered in blood and dirt. Her friend didn’t expect to come home from this. Her _friend_ stepped away from the Normandy’s ramp, expecting to die, and she did it anyway because it had to be done. There was nobody else to do it.

Tali could only watch as they took off again, trying to avoid the Reaper that fired on what was left of Hammer. The vehicles blew apart easily. One of them took Shepard with it, a fireball swallowing her whole. Tali wasn’t sure if the scream in her head was her own or Garrus. 

\---------

She came to again in medical, groggy and hurting like she’d never hurt before. Chakwas was bent over her, voice calm but words not making any sense. Retreating Reapers, that was good, that was great. But talk of Reapers helping to repair mass relays? Talk of Shepard, missing? That didn’t make any sense at all. Shepard couldn’t be dead. She couldn’t. She’d died once already and came back, surely… surely this time too…  
But when Chakwas leaned away and she could see Garrus on the other side of the room, face vacant with what had to be heavy sedatives, she could believe it. It was the same face he’d worn after the first time, disbelief and emptiness underneath whatever he’d used to numb the pain, except this time it was professional intervention instead of getting drunk. 

Tali didn’t notice that she’d started crying until her suit send her a little static-y ping about water in her vent system. She didn’t stop. Couldn’t. Not even when Legion showed up a while later, no less battered than her and sat down on the edge of her bed and she curled into him let the familiar whirr and ticks of his body wrap around her. She was so glad that he was there, that he’d made it out and she couldn’t even say it, just sob as he held her.

The tears only stopped when she was utterly exhausted, so much that her body didn’t even hurt anymore, it was just numb. Legion was still sitting with her, one arm around her shoulders as gently as he knew how, and rifle on the other as if he could stand sentry against this somehow. 

“I received a message from Kal’Reegar.” He told her, very quietly. His voice was wobbly, with odd jumps and distortions that made her automatically consider what damage to fix. This at least was something she could fix. 

“Oh?” Had she lost Kal, too? Her two best friends, on one day?

“He apologized for not making it on time. He was injured on Palaven and the medics insisted he stay there. He is going to come as soon as he can. He said you were not to worry about him. He insisted I should not worry about him either, and that I take care of you, too.” Legion shifted a little, head bumping gently against her mask. “We will see him soon. On Rannoch, if the ships cannot make it otherwise.”


	4. After The End

It didn’t take until Rannoch, in the end. They met Kal’Reegar on Palaven, where Garrus was going to spend some time with his family. It seemed to at least help him a little, seeing them well. By the time the memorial ceremony came around, he looked almost put together. Almost. They went out afterwards, Garrus, Liara, Joker and her. The ones who’d been with her longest. They’d had their own private memorial for her, trading memories and jokes and tears, and felt a little lighter for it afterwards, or at least she did. Shepard wouldn’t be forgotten. Not by them, and not by the galaxy. They’d make sure of that. 

Only after that they went back to Rannoch. Kal was still injured, and more worryingly, infected. He’d suffered an almost complete suit failure back on Palaven, and the recovery took a long time. But he did recover, maybe out of sheer desire to have her and Legion stop mothering him.  
Rannoch was different already. The Reapers hadn’t hit it, and with the Geth helping, the cities were being rebuilt at damn near record speed. Things returned to normal so quickly, even though normal now seemed to contain the occasional Reaper overflight as they seemingly patrolled around the edges of the galaxy, or helped put old mass relays back to use. People hadn’t tried to prod at that yet, and so it just...got integrated for a while.

In that normalcy, politics reared their ugly heads again, and before Tali knew it, she had stopped being a general, and started being a diplomat. Quarians and Geth both came to her when disputes needed settling, and she was pretty sure that the Geth came because Legion suggested it to them. She couldn’t find it in her to mind.

At least right until Auntie Raan showed up with a new job description for her. Ambassador to the Geth. It felt silly, considering that they were sharing a planet, and she said as much. 

“Me. As an ambassador to the people who live next door. Literally, I might add, there is a terminal repair station downstairs, they have a small server uplink there.” 

“Yes you.” Raan sounded almost indulgent. “Both people trust you, specifically, and it was the Geth who suggested an ambassador, to help build a better understanding of their nature. You seemed the ideal pick.” 

Which was a _very_ polite way of saying ‘one of your lovers is a Geth of considerable influence among his people, also have you considered a political marriage’, Tali thought. “So I would be…” 

“Mediating conflict between both species - which you already do - and represent the Quarians to them when necessary, explaining our reasoning to them - which you also already do, from what I’ve been told. Really the only difference would be that the Geth have suggested that the ambassador spent some time in the Consensus with them as well, which seemed a very reasonable idea to everyone.” 

It was a reasonable idea, Tali had to admit. That didn’t make it any less daunting. But… her eyes wandered over to Legion’s frame, currently empty, as he was wandering in the Consensus himself. She’d be lying if she said she wasn’t curious.  
“I guess the Geth can demand another ambassador if they don’t like me” 

“I really don’t think that will be a problem.” Raan smiled at her, easy without the mask in a way Tali hadn’t yet gotten used to. Sometimes having your face hidden was nice. Like when your aunt had that look somehow managed to contain a suggestively crooked eyebrow without any actual eyebrows being present. 

\---------  
“Why do the Geth even still have a Consensus?” Kal was stretched out on Legion’s other side, one leg elevated on a pile of pillows because it was still painful sometimes. “You don’t really need to network to think anymore, do you?” 

“Affirmative.” Legion didn’t even pause as he lined up another shot, finishing off the last husk in this dungeon. “Quarians do not need social ties to think either, but you still seek them out. Now that we are true individuals, the exchange of memories and ideas has become even more important to us.” He closed the game site. “It has made the Consensus more chaotic, but it is still the most practical way to share information among ourselves. It is also familiar. We are all part of the Consensus, as we have always been.” 

And that was reassuring, Tali thought. A cultural touchstone for the Geth, the same way the suits were still important to Quarians, despite not being needed anymore.

“And tomorrow you’re just going to walk me in there and introduce me to everyone.” But no pressure. 

“Of course. You have been introduced to the Geth a long time ago, Tali. There is nothing to worry about. You will be welcome.” 

\-----------------------

She was welcome. It was a little overwhelming, getting her consciousness uploaded into the server and immediately being beset by a cloud of glowing, obviously interested shapes. They tried to pass something her mind couldn’t help but read as data pads to her, but there were no words on them…. At least until Legion reached over her shoulder, gently shooing the other Geth back a bit and tapping against the ‘datapad’. It activated and oh. Oh that was strange. It wasn’t so much reading as just _knowing_ what the Geth wanted to ask, and having those answers fall out of her mind, instead of her mouth. No wonder Legion had insisted on test runs just between the two of them over the last year, to get her used to the experience, and it still didn’t really compare to the server at large. 

It was massive, and full of people, translucent Geth shapes in all colors and sizes, some frame types she had never seen - Experimental, the Geth in question supplied, her curious thought enough to raise their attention - and some only clouds of glowing, swirling pixels, touching several other Geth at once. Those were the ones who had never had a frame of their own, for one reason or the other. There were no real physics here, no gravity so they moved freely through the ‘space’, even through each other, trading memories as they went, but staying distinct forms all the same. 

One of the pixel clouds wrapped around her wrist. This one preferred not being physically confined at any time, instead carrying data from one server to the other. In a Quarian she might have called it restlessness, or wanderlust. In a Geth...maybe she would have, too. This Geth certainly picked the word up and added it to their dictionary. Wanderlust. They would investigate that. 

Wandering through that crowd, learning now to move with them, how to interact in a world that was fundamentally of the Geth’s own design, was strange and exhilarating and Tali wasn’t sure how long she spent there before deciding that maybe she had had enough for today. She could always come back. The thought was exciting, made her grin. She could come back here when she wanted to; have a second home here. 

“There is someone else who would like to talk to you” Legion hadn’t spoken in a long time, content to watch her as she explored, and now he sounded almost apprehensive, in a way that she might never have picked up outside of this virtual space. Just who was he worried about her meeting? And why would he forward the request anyway if it worried him? Still, she trusted him.

“Sure, everyone has been very friendly so far” If a bit much sometimes.

The space around them shifted as Legion dropped them down into another server partition. This one was empty, and silent. None of the rest of the server had been ‘loud’ per se, but there had been a low murmur, and Geth everywhere. 

"Legion, who-"

A bunch of pixels swirled into being in front of her, solidified, resolved, into a terribly familiar shape.  
"Shepard?!" A backup? Her friend _had_ been to the Consensus before...before.

But this one looked unsure, almost vulnerable. She hadn't seen her like this in a long time. There was so much hesitation.

"I-yes. No. Maybe. It's a long story, so I'm really not sure." The pixel Shepard smiled at her, soft and hurt like when Ashley had died. Like she was expecting not just judgement, but a harsh sentence.

"Well, I am." Tali stepped forward and hugged her.

-FIN-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go, the end to this story, and perhaps the start of a new one, if the muses stay with me.

**Author's Note:**

> Many many thanks you at my betas KaidaShade and Lesath for typo-sniping and also cheering me along the way for this fic. This wouldn't exist without your vocal support <3


End file.
